Live Free with Josh Howerton - A Healthy Response to Failure | Ep. 294 | Thursday, March 21, 2024

Episode Date: March 21, 2024

Just as Jesus prophesied, Peter denied knowing Jesus three times when less than 24 hours prior, he promised to be faithful. Matthew’s account of this story tells us that Peter was grieved and owned his failure. He stayed with the group instead of letting failure isolate him. Are you letting failure or embarrassment keep you from others? Who is one person you can reach out to today? For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's Word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.com. Church slash daily drive. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. A welcome to the Daily Drive. Wherever you're listening from, just know how excited we are that you're joining us today. We have been doing this Monday through Friday for over a year now,

and so many of you faithfully tune in daily and then share it with your friends, and I'm just so grateful to be on this journey of getting to know God a little better with all of y'all. My name is Bro, by the way, and we left off yesterday in John Chapter 13 with the boastful claim of one of Jesus' closest followers, this tough guy named Peter, who tells Jesus that he would never betray. him, that he would never bail on him, that he, in fact, would die for him, if need be. Well, Jesus tells him that he will, in fact, have a chance to do all of that, and will totally choke, that before the rooster crows the next morning, Peter will have already disowned Jesus

three times, and that's exactly what happens. We jumped over to the Gospel of Matthew to see his account of this story, and in that account we see a few things Peter does right after he blows it so badly. And these are three things that I think all of us who fail, and that would be like all of us? Three things that Peter does that helps us all resurface and find forgiveness and hope. And the first thing he does right is this. He owns his stuff. He owns his stuff.

He owned his failure. He owned his sin. He admitted he had blown it. Matthew writes that after the rooster crows, Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken before the rooster crows. you will disown me three times. And he went outside and wept bitterly. Now there's a couple of things there. First of all, he remembered the word Jesus has spoken.

It's like Peter's going, you know what? Jesus was right. I was wrong. I said I would never fall. He said I would. He was right. I was wrong. Have you discovered the amazing freedom in those three words?

I was wrong. Proverbs 2813 says a man or a woman who refuses to admit their mistakes can never be successful, but if they confess and forsake them, they'd get another chance. Peter owned it. He admitted his failure and was broken by it, and the once proud rock was reduced to a pile of rubble, and he went out and wept bitterly. You know, I've said it before, and we teach this all the time in our recovery groups, but there's a big difference between being broken and being miserable.

You could be really sorry that you got caught, or you could be absolutely miserable that you're having to live now with the consequences of what you did. Or you can drop your pride, humble yourself, be genuinely remorseful and ask the God of grace for help. And when you do that, when you come to him in that brokenness, that's when hope rises. James, chapter four, says God opposes the proud,

but it gives grace to the humble. So humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. Peter does that. He owned his stuff. And if we want to experience the full grace of God, we need to do the same. There's another thing that Peter does that's kind of subtle. It's kind of between the lines, but it's so healthy, so wise. Not only did he own his failure, he stayed in the group. He stayed in the group. When we find him in the boat over in John chapter 21 after the crucifixion of Jesus, guess what? He's not alone. It says in John 21 that Thomas, Nathaniel, James,

John and a couple of other disciples were in the boat as well. It's like Peter says, I'm going fishing. And we do that, don't we? We just return to whatever we knew best before we failed. And they say, you know what, we'll go with you. And so the seven of them go out that night. They catch absolutely nothing, but at least they were together, just good friends in the same boat. In fact, right after Peter admitted his failure and wept bitterly about it, we find him right back in the group, hiding out in an upper room with the rest of the guys. And by the way, Jesus was right about them too. They all would shrink back.

They all would fall away that night, just not as publicly as Peter did. And now Peter is back on the fishing team with these same guys. He knew that all of them really were in the same boat, so to speak. And you know what, in regard to failure, sin, shame, regret, all of us are in the same boat, too. It's amazing how most of us are like the rest of us, right? And it's a wonderfully healing thing to surround yourself with good people who know that they have failures too.

And they know they need to own them too. And they know they need to be real with them too and confess them too and experience God's restorative grace together. There's power in the group. Stay in the group. I was sometimes running into people I haven't seen in church for a while.

I say, hey, man, I miss you. Where you been? I said, well, I had some stuff going on my life. It's been kind of a really hard time. I just said, I go, so, so. like where you been. Don't ever let failure isolate you. Stay in the group.

You know, a lot of people begin to think, man, after what I've done, there's no way I could show my face around there again. Oh, you're wrong, you're wrong. We're all in the same boat. Stay in the group. Well, I have no place in a worship service after the things I have done and thought.

No, stay in the group. I'm too embarrassed, man. I'm too ashamed. No, stay in the group. Well, my friends won't accept me now. Then they aren't your friends. Stay in the group. There's healing.

in the group. Ecclesiastes 410 says if one person falls, the other can reach out and help, but people who are alone when they fall? Man, they're in real trouble. Listen, gang, we all fall down. Own your stuff. Stay in the group, and hope will begin to rise. There's one more thing that Peter does right, and anyone who wants to resurface and find joy and hope in real life must do as well. So come back tomorrow, and we'll unpack the rest of this story, and hope you have a great day. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturdays at 5 p.m. and Sundays at 9.30 and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time.

For more information, visit lakepoint.com. Church slash daily drive.