- Peter's Shame (pm)

The scripture reading for tonight is from the Gospel of John, chapter 21, verses 15 to 19.

Peter felt hurt 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.

Very truly I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished.

But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hand and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.

He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.

After this, he said to him,

Follow me.

This is the word of the Lord.

That passage, can everybody hear me okay?

That passage ended with the words that are right there at the very beginning of the Gospel of John.

Which opens with the theme of Jesus saying, follow me.

What had just happened?

What had just happened at Easter is we know that Judas had handed over Jesus to be crucified.

And Peter, who had boasted that even if all the others fail you, I will die with you.

I will never ever forsake you.

And Jesus said, Peter, before the sun even rises tomorrow morning, you will have denied me three times.

That's one of the most...

Famous moments in Scripture.

We all have promised with our mouths and failed to deliver.

You can understand somewhat how Peter feels.

Before I go any further, I want to recommend a book to you.

You know that the guy who has had the worst reputation in Scripture is Judas Iscariot.

There has been a debate from the beginning on Judas.

And whether he is as bad as he's made out to be, whether he's the most evil scoundrel on earth,

or whether he simply fulfilled the will of God, delivered over a lamb to be an atoning sacrifice.

If you want to see a fine, fine example of just good, solid biblical studies, get this book.

It's called Judas Iscariot, Revisited and Restored by Ivan Rogers.

It's about a decade.

And Rogers is just a Bible dude.

A pastor, Bible dude.

Just does his homework.

Read that little essay, and I think you'll come away blessed by that.

Peter had denied Christ.

And here we see a special appointment, a special meeting that Jesus has arranged to meet Peter face to face and three times ask him.

For each time you denied me, I wanted to...

I wanted to ask you, do you love me, Peter?

It's from the Gospel of John where we heard the story of the Good Shepherd, the parable of the Good Shepherd.

And Jesus would ask Peter here, if you love me, feed my sheep.

I'm making you a sheepdog and an under-shepherd for my flock.

I'm restoring you.

I want to talk to you about character.

Character is what is being revealed when sudden, unexpected circumstances come upon us.

I heard about a decade ago, the last time there was an earthquake in Japan, maybe it was the last ten earthquakes ago,

an article written by someone who was in an office tower when it began shaking and the windows began busting.

Observed everything that happened, and when it was over, came back and had this reflection.

I saw an office full of people.

90% of them froze in fear.

Just froze or began to walk around aimlessly while the building shook.

Then I saw about 5 or 10% absolutely fall on the ground in hysterical, mindless panic and become a danger to themselves and to others.

And then I saw...

A few people who clearly identified each other as leaders and began to calm people down, point them towards the exits, and began to lead people.

Two of them actually picked up someone who was having a hysterical fit and directed others to help that person calm down and lead them out.

And upon reflecting what he had experienced, he did a little study on human behavior.

He found that when sudden stress and fear and life-threatening circumstances occur,

that apparently there is a statistical reality here.

That the majority of us will tend to freeze.

That some of us will absolutely become useless in fear and catatonia and panic.

And that a handful of others will find themselves super-alert with time slowing down.

They often do identify the other ones,

who are not only keeping their marbles,

but are suddenly able to rise to this occasion and do things they never knew they had in them.

And that's what people will say.

I never ever knew I had this in me.

And he was saying the thing that surprised me the most

is that one of the people who was on the floor acting like a child and was useless

was our boss.

So that someone who had the positional authority

at a moment of crisis,

revealed a different kind of character trait.

And others had come forward and become leaders.

It's what we do under pressure.

That we have different character traits under pressure.

And what we mean by character

is a set of predisposed habits and tendencies in yourself

that will often be revealed when sudden pressure comes upon you.

The real you.

I'm careful to say the real you,

because we're more complex than that.

But something about you that's only shown

either when a stressful sudden emergency happens

or how you behave when no one's looking and you have no accountability.

Those are the two things that will tend to reveal aspects of ourselves.

So, Henry Finston Perry,

please give us a video called

New York Subway Hero.

On the New York City subway,

it's hard enough finding someone who will give up his seat to a stranger,

let alone be willing to give up his life for one.

The train was coming in like,

light like that.

It happened just...

50-year-old Wesley Autry,

a construction worker and Navy veteran,

was standing on a subway platform

with his two little girls,

when right in front of them,

a man started having a seizure.

He kind of stumbled over his own feet and fall backwards.

I see the train coming,

but the train is so close.

I'm like,

what do I do?

Wesley jumped onto the tracks and thought

if he could just lie on top of the man,

keep him from flailing,

maybe the train would roll right over both of them.

The clearance was exactly 21 inches.

Wesley and the man,

20 and a half.

No way the train could stop before this gentleman

could get him up off the tracks.

So he covered him with his body and pushed him down to a point

where the train wouldn't hit his head

and held him down under the tracks

while the train came and rolled right over the top.

It gave Wesley's children the scare of their young lives.

I thought he was going to get killed.

And Wesley, the scare of his too.

I'm like talking to him, sir, you can't move.

I got two kids up here looking for the father to come back.

I don't know him.

He don't know me.

But listen, don't panic.

You know, I'm here to save you.

As for the guy Wesley saved,

he's 20-year-old Cameron Halepter.

And other than a few scrapes and bruises,

his father says he's doing fine.

Mr. Autry's instinctive and selfish act saved our sins.

You know, the word hero gets thrown around a lot nowadays.

What a better way to say it is to start off the new year

than to say save a life.

Nice to be reminded of what one really looks like.

Steve Hartman, CBS News, New York.

Here's a New Year's resolution for you.

Save someone's life.

That's a good way to start your day.

You see, people have no idea usually what they will do.

You wish you'd be that.

You hope you'd be that.

And you really don't know.

We don't know.

And even if we were once a hero in a past stressful situation,

we don't actually know if on the next one

we'll have this kind of, that kind of heroism.

And then you reflect afterwards.

There's that reflection afterwards.

Often people like this,

and this is by no means the only circumstance like this,

you will hear people say things like,

well, I just thought this is what your average decent fellow citizen would do for...

Like that, people reflect and say,

I didn't feel anything heroic come over me.

I just felt, holy crap, a person in need, I'm here to help and do it.

And then afterwards they realize,

yeah, that was extraordinarily dangerous.

Or other people will reflect quietly in their hearts and say,

I used to have an opinion of myself.

That I was higher and better than the average.

To the point where I would say,

Lord, the rest of these schmucks will desert you.

I won't.

Because I know I would even die for you.

I feel that in me.

And you don't know until the stress comes.

Something in your character is going to be revealed.

Really good intentions.

Really, really sincere devotion for Jesus.

And then when his life,

he felt threatened,

that someone identified him and said,

aren't you one of the disciples?

That's all I was.

I thought you were one of his followers.

That was enough.

To have him say,

no, no, I don't even know the guy.

And we know about the self-reflection.

That it says he ran away after that third denial.

He ran away and hid himself and cried bitterly.

Cried tears of shame and sorrow.

And it's over that,

that this little scene emerges.

Because when Jesus died,

this moment,

there's no doctrine of the resurrection yet.

There's no sense that,

that's okay,

in a minute we're going to be part of the church

and take over the Roman Empire

and change human history

and I will be remembered as the first pope

by at least half of the Christians.

We'll acknowledge this.

I know that's coming.

He knew nothing of this.

What he knew is that his hopes and dreams for the future

died on that cross.

And if he didn't hide his sorry rear end,

he was going to be next.

When you lose all your dreams,

they go back to old habit patterns, right?

It is,

go back to where you were,

fishing with the guys in the Sea of Galilee.

This is where he went.

And it is when he had been called onto the shore

by that mysterious stranger.

And when the stranger suggested that since they'd caught nothing,

try just off shore here,

casting your net on the other side,

like this guy knows something about fishing.

And they pull up 153 fish

and they realize this is,

this is the master.

And Jesus sups with them.

He provides food for them.

And they have a time where they're eating together

and it says,

none of them dared ask him who he was.

Because they all knew in their hearts

it was the Lord.

So if they knew it was the Lord,

why were they saying,

we should ask?

Why did they feel,

none of them dared ask,

who are you?

Well,

Jesus revealed himself to them

and then we get this moment where

he calls Peter aside

and asks him three times,

Peter do you love me?

And you know,

Peter says,

you know,

I love you.

Then feed my sheep.

Three times.

And after he says it the third time,

he says,

follow me,

like I asked you to.

Follow me.

And remember when he said,

you would die for me?

I'm going to give you that chance.

Because when you were a young guy,

you could go wherever you wanted to go.

But there's going to come a time in your future

when people are going to take you

where you don't want to go.

Follow me to that same place.

Jesus humbles him.

Presumably this is semi-public.

These other disciples are overhearing this.

I like that scene better.

There's a little bit of surgery,

emotional surgery here,

putting his finger on the shame.

You know,

the thing about ego

and the thing about pride

is the higher you climb,

the harder you fall,

right?

He accused all the others

of being weakling runaways.

But I won't.

I'll stay with you.

So maybe you need a little public humility there.

So,

Peter says,

I love you.

Sometimes shame

is a huge teaching moment

if we face

our own sense

that we had talked ourselves up this high

and we fail.

And you hear yourself

saying prayers like,

God,

help me never,

ever,

ever be like that again.

Have you ever had times like that?

Have you ever been ashamed of something

that it

sticks with you

the rest of your life?

I have one like that.

There's lots of crap I've done in my life.

I'll tell you one that really, really sticks to me.

I'll give you two.

They have to do with my adolescence.

Because I've matured since then,

and I'm really together now.

But I had two very good childhood friends

that we grew up with as kids.

Until grade nine.

And in grade nine,

they were not cool enough for me.

Because there was another group

that I wanted to hang around with

that were much, much cooler.

And I betrayed these two childhood friends.

I made fun of them.

I called them down in front of this other group.

And I stopped hanging out with them

because I was personally ashamed of them.

Because I was insecure.

Insecure.

And you've sucked up to this group.

And all my life,

it has bugged me to this day

that I did that to them.

One of them didn't get it.

But I know that another one did.

And I know that another one knew

that I was too good for them.

And I don't have childhood friends.

I don't have friendships.

Because I cut them off.

That I wish I had.

The other one is making fun of a special needs kid.

When my sister was like that.

Because the group was making fun.

So I did too.

And I had one friend who grew up in a group home.

And he defended her.

And he called us all what we were.

He said,

What are you doing?

Why are you acting like this?

And I should have known better.

To this day, I can still see where I was.

How I talked.

Because of the group, you know.

I was going to fit in with the group.

So.

The teaching moment of shame.

So you take yourself out

for that darn good talking to.

And you hear those prayers.

God, give me the strength, the faith, the courage.

To change.

To do right.

To face up to opposition.

It's a very important stage in personal growth.

It's to face up to our failings.

To reflect upon what they reveal about us.

I've joked around here a few times that one of my purposes

in life is to make sure I offend everybody.

At least some of the time.

It's an equal opportunity offence.

And let me know.

I have an affirmative action program.

If I have not offended you enough lately,

I can do about ten in a row.

But the truth in that is this.

That half the time when we're offended,

it's our pride that's hurt.

And what is revealed is there's a teaching moment here.

Why am I sensitive to that?

Why did that get to me?

What is that about me?

That is such a big question.

Why am I sensitive to that?

It's such an important part of self-development and learning

about what we are really like.

And then reasonably, not with self-hatred and self-loathing

and feeling I'm weak and I can't ever succeed

or any of the self-talk that's destructive.

But with reasonable and responsible action,

choose to learn and to turn and to improve and to grow.

That is why character formation is often

described this way.

It is simply the method of replacing bad habits

with good habits.

But either way, you're going to be grooving into habits.

And the sooner we learn the habit of Christ-likeness

and of personal integrity, the better.

We want to establish new habits that create integrity

between the outside person and the inside.

So that what is outside reflects

what's honestly on the inside.

The ego-based face, the need to fit in with the group

by putting somebody else down, that's a lack of integrity.

But what is inside without a side?

And then we have the blessing of a good conscience

and a joyful spirit.

But what happens when the failure is not one like,

I thought I was a great leader and then I was useless

when the building began to shake.

What if, as I just shared,

our failure deeply hurts another person.

Hurts another person.

So that you're ashamed to face that person.

Have you ever been in that circumstance?

Has anybody not been in a circumstance

where you have been ashamed to face someone?

Especially someone that you have hurt.

That's an incredibly vulnerable place to be.

And you can be righteously condemned.

You can have a finger wagging

and you have to cap in hand and agree that that was me.

But how incredible life-changing it can be

when at that moment of personal shame,

you are given grace and gentleness and mercy.

I have had people like that in my life

who, when I had egg all over my face,

didn't even look at that and say,

oh, there I am, I've got a teaching moment with that guy.

But actually had compassion on my shame

and came humbly to that place

and gave life-giving mercy and grace.

Because everything in John here is rhetorical.

What Jesus said.

What Jesus was doing is saying,

Peter, I know you love me.

I know you love me.

I know you're confused about how you could have let me down

because you talked yourself into something you weren't.

I know you love me.

I need you and I need everybody else

to just hear it.

Feed my sheep.

Why?

Because before you have learned what it is

to be a sinner and a failure,

you cannot go into the world and feed people the gospel.

Unless you understand your need to receive love and forgiveness,

you cannot preach the message to others, Peter.

And I am not just reconciling with you.

I am restoring you to a better position.

Better.

With more self-knowledge.

To be a stronger leader.

A strong enough disciple that you will,

you will be able to die for me like you prophesied.

Well,

I want to say to you that a lot of work,

let's think about you, Doug, too.

Thinking of pastoral work

and let's think of your board work

the last four years.

And I think how much of our work

is reconciliation.

It's just trying to bring things back to health

from all the many ways we go sideways.

And it's one,

one person, all of us going sideways

and hurting another person.

And so much of life we do,

we want to build and move ahead

and we can and we should,

but we have to have the foundation of reconciliation first.

And what this is teaching is

that's the normal state of affairs.

Do not get impatient and say,

I've had enough of you disciples letting me down.

I need winners from now forward.

I need a bunch of Donald Trumps

from now on.

I don't know why that came out of my mouth.

Please pray for my soul.

There's an irony about the word winner

because I do not see him as one.

But I love him in the Lord.

I love him encased in my faith.

If I come near him,

I will squirt theoretical love at him.

While keeping healthy boundaries,

healthy boundaries.

So a lot of our work,

thank you, I need to cut the tension a bit here.

A lot of our work is just reconciling

and making the foundation solid again

for a few steps forward

before we make a couple backwards again.

And then a few more steps forward and a couple back

where we're restoring one another

and forgiving one another and healing one another.

So in my weirdness this week,

I did some research on the Hutterite community.

I'm studying German history

and the history of the German diaspora.

And among the most fascinating communities

were the Anabaptist communities

and especially the Hutterite communities

because unlike other Anabaptists,

they're probably the most successful communists

in the world because their colonies

have continued to exist for about four, five hundred years.

1530.

So I found a fantastic movie,

little half-hour documentary

made by the Canadian film board.

Your tax dollar's working for you in 1963.

1663 before any of you were born. But that's okay because the Mennonites haven't changed

or the Mennonites have a little bit, but the Hutterites haven't changed much in 400 years

so this little documentary moment I'm about to give you will be very relevant. So just

listen to the spirit of this. The question, before we hit the Hutterite philosophy, the

question is about ownership in a community setting. And the question is, what do you

have in your communes, in your colonies, that those of us who don't live this way don't

have? What does this lifestyle give you?

What can you own in the colony?

Well, anything right in my house. That's my possession, which ain't much.

We get an oak chest when we're 15, that's mine. Nobody can take it away from me. But

outside of that, anything in the colony, I couldn't very well say it's mine, it belongs

to the whole colony.

What do you think, by living in a colony, you have the people who don't live in such

a tight you would have?

I couldn't get that question.

Go ahead.

This colony business was started, I don't know how many years ago.

1530.

Well, Jacob Hutter started it. But even before that, the Apostles started it. Act II is really

where our life comes in. Keeping all things common, nothing having a role. That's how

it started, and that's the way we want to keep it. That's the way the whole world is supposed

to be. Our home is supposed to be in time to come in heaven. But on this earth, you

have to love thy neighbor.

And how can you show love if you don't live together? Do things for one another. If one

is sick, take care of him. If he can't work, let somebody else do it. If you don't get

along with your neighbor, you don't have to look him in the face every morning. Or say

hello to him, you could leave. But in the colony, you see all the members. And if you

have some misunderstanding amongst yourselves, well, you can't go on living and hating him.

You have to get things right, and go back where you started. Am I right?

She's telling him. Isn't that right? How do you people live in Calgary? Yeah, you walk

away from your neighbor. The line that struck me was just, how can you love someone if you

don't live with them? Wow. That's a very different way to think. We are called to love one another.

But how can you love if you don't live together? Now you're thinking, well, I'm not going to

live on a farm in Alberta, somewhere where we're all sharing bunk houses and stuff. No.

Do you think you can live in the middle of Calgary? You can be living jam-packed together.

Have you seen the houses in the size of the lots? Biggest prairies on the face of the

earth, and you've got a six foot wide lot between the houses? And that's spreading here.

Go to the western communities. But you don't know your neighbor. You don't even know who lives across the

street. You are in fact not living together. You are biologically and economically existing

side by side, and mutually exploiting each other in the wonders of the division of labor

and the use of currency. But you don't know anybody. So what struck here is, what have

we got that you don't have? We've got a community of people who know that if I have an argument

with you, I'm going to see you.

I'm going to see you tomorrow, and I'm going to have to work it out. I'm going to have

to feel stupid and ashamed and face you on the farm and have to work it out and maybe

say I'm sorry. And when I do, I'm going to need you to say I know you love me. I know

we're family. I know that was just a mood swing. You were afraid of dying. So I get

that. So, sudden crisis comes upon us. I don't know

when was the last time something like that has happened in your life. A sudden crisis

happens and suddenly something is revealed about you. And something is seen by others

in you. And we're all in this together. We're all in this together where our character may

suddenly shine in ways that we can say, I don't know, I just jumped on a guy and held

him down and said, don't move buddy, I want my kids to see me again. I don't even know

what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over

me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can

say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an

earful of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people,

I don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know

what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over

me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can

say to an earful of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an earful

of people, I don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I

don't even know what came over me. Or I can say to an earful of people, I don't even know

It is knowing that you are loved.

I loved your prayer, Aaron.

Thank you for that.

But to know that we are loved is hero-making.

You definitely see that when you see mothers

loving over their vulnerable little children.

Love and being loved

and needing to be loved for someone

is one of the most hero-making character traits.

And Jesus just wants Peter to keep growing in his love.

And love is not about necessarily liking everybody every day.

But it is about putting on your boots

and walking over the neighbor's house

and going through the motions of saying,

I'm sorry, I sinned against you, I need your grace.

And there's nothing more lovely than the hugs and the tears

and the kisses that come

when you receive grace and mercy and forgiveness.

We're called then to live like Jesus.

And when we do, we will live in that same tent

where some people will love the light that shines from us

and others will hate us.

And the only thing that will make us

not a bunch of hypocrites and just another religious cult

that gives religion a bad name

is if we can't show what it is to forgive one another,

to be able to say I'm sorry

and to be able to say I love you again.

That is why we've been called as the people

who should be called the children of God.

And in the Beatitudes,

the people who are called the children of God

are the peacemakers.

Those who bring compassion and mercy.

Those who bring justice and reconciliation.

Those who create conditions for love

to repair and rebuild the foundations.

That is being Christ-like.

That is what it is to follow me, as Jesus said.

Follow me, be imitators then.

Of me, of my heart.

And I think this is our value

when Caitlin gave us that new verb a few weeks ago

that we can be busy being placemakers,

making a place like that little commune

where family and friendship

and it's safe to be embarrassed and ashamed

because the love is stronger.

Let's make places like that.

Let's create environments of peace and reconciliation.

And second chances.

And joyful friendships.

And be family.

Because we are the children of God.

Amen.

Let's have a hymn.