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You are listening to the Ron Dunn Podcast.
Ron Dunn is a well-known author and was one of the most in-demand preachers during the
latter part of the 20th century.
He led Bible studies all over the United States, Europe, and South Africa.
For more information and resources from Ron Dunn, please visit rondunn.com.
I want you to open your Bibles this evening to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 22.
The Gospel of Luke, chapter 22.
And I want to read verses 24 through 34.
The Gospel of Luke, the 22nd chapter, verses 24 through 34.
The scene is, as you will immediately recognize, the upper room.
Jesus is eating the Passover supper with his disciples,
and in just a few moments they'll be leaving the upper room
and will make their way to the Garden of Gethsemane at the foot of Mount Olive,
just the night before Jesus, or the night Jesus is crucified.
We'll begin reading in verse 24.
And there was also a strife among them, which of them should be accounted the greatest.
And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them,
and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors.
But ye shall not be so.
But he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he that is chief as he that does serve.
For whether is greater he that sits at meat or he that serves?
Is it not he that sits at meat?
But I am among you as he who serves. Is it not he that sets at meat? But I am among you as he who serves. You are they who have
continued with me in my tribulations. And I appoint unto you a kingdom as my Father has
appointed unto me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones,
judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan
has desired to have you that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee that thy faith
fail not. And when you are turned again, strengthen your brethren. And he said unto him, Lord, I am
ready to go with you both into prison and to death.
And he said, I tell you, Peter, the cock shall not crow this day before that you will three times deny that you know me.
I believe I mentioned when I was here last year that one of my favorite Christian writers through the years was a man by the name of C.S. Lewis, who was a professor of medieval literature in Cambridge and Oxford and wrote a number of Christian books that we're all familiar with, Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce,
The Problem of Pain, Mere Christianity, and such as that. But the first thing I ever read by C.S. Lewis was his spiritual autobiography. And in that book,
as he told how as an atheist, God had dealt with him and he wasn't saved until he was already
an adult. And as I said, he had been an atheist all of his life. And then he met Christ. And so
as he was writing this spiritual autobiography, he mentioned that on two occasions, this was before he was ever a Christian, while he was still an atheist,
that on two different occasions there came to him from out of nowhere and for no understandable reason,
there came to him just a fleeting moment of pure joy. Unadulterated, unmixed, pure joy. Just a sensation of pure joy
that just passed through him for just a moment and was unlike anything he had ever experienced
before. That happened to him on two occasions. Both as a surprise there was no reason to account for
it and it was just such such absolute pure joy in his heart that he could never forget it
and he said i found myself trying to recapture that joy and he said said, I found it when I found Christ. And he said, I was surprised
by joy. And that was the title of his book, Surprised by Joy. When he met Jesus Christ,
he found that joy that he had always been looking for. Never thought he would find it in Christianity,
but he was surprised by joy. I think that's a great thing to be able to say. I think that's a neat title for a person's spiritual biography.
Surprised by joy.
I've been considering writing my own spiritual autobiography.
I'm considering calling it surprised by misery.
Or surprised by failure.
Because the truth of the matter is,
one of the greatest surprises I've had in my
Christian life has been my failure and my misery. I think that's true of all of us who've been saved.
At the moment of conversion, or when we come back to God at the moment of some great peak experience,
we feel like that everything will now be different and we'll never again know the pain of failure.
We'll never again know the misery of sinning against God.
And we feel like that for finally once and for all we've got our feet established
and from then on out it's going to be joy all the way.
And it surprises us to discover that in spite of all of our good intentions
and in spite of all of our deepest commitments,
the old nature has more
lives than a cat, and it just keeps coming back and back and back, attacking us, and we discover
many times ourselves lying flat on our face in failure and misery. Surprised that that would
ever happen to us again. Surprised that after such a high moment of joy in the Lord, we could ever know
such depths of misery and failure. I know we'll forget when I was pastor in Irving, we had a young
man, I think he was around 14 years old, come to Christ one Sunday morning. And when I presented
him to the church, I did what I sometimes would do. I didn't do this all the time, but occasionally
when I felt like it was right,
and I was presenting a new convert to the congregation, I would ask them if they would like to share a word of testimony. You know, that's a good way to start your Christian life,
and no better place to share it than right here in front of all these people that love you and
rejoice with you. So when I presented Tommy to the church, I said, now Tommy, do you have anything
you'd like to say to the church? He said, yes, sir, I certainly do, pastor. I just want everybody to
know I feel great. I feel terrific. I've never felt this great in all my life, and I'm never,
I'm never going to lose this feeling. Well, when he said that, I thought maybe a little pastoral
counseling would be in order, and I said, well, now, Tom, we all know how you're feeling.
And, man, we know you feel great.
But, you know, you might not always feel quite as good as you do right now.
He said, no, sir, pastor, I'm never going to lose this feeling, man.
I've never felt like this in my life.
I feel terrific.
I'm never going to lose this feeling.
Well, now, son, we all know how great you feel.
But, you know, we don't want to put our confidence and our faith in our feelings. We put our confidence and faith in the Word of God. And
you know, there's a slight chance that you may not always feel as great as you feel right now.
No, pastor, I'm never going to lose this feeling. I just feel terrific. I feel wonderful. Well,
I let it go. I didn't think it'd look very good for the pastor to have an argument with a new
convert right there on the spot. And let's face it, there's some things you can't tell anybody.
And so I said, well, God bless you, son.
About three weeks later, this young man drags himself into my office.
Oh, he is in a state.
He says, Pastor, can I see you for a minute?
And I said, well, sure, come on in.
We went in and sat down.
I said, what's the matter?
He said, I think I'm lost.
And he
began to tell about failure in his life. And he was surprised that he had failed. He was surprised
that he had sinned again. Of course, I was gracious enough not to mention that I had warned him of
this. But I understood how he felt, because to tell you the truth, I've had feelings like that. I've had high
times with God when I thought, boy, from now on, it'll always be this way. I mean, after
being raised to such a lofty summit of joy and the awareness of God's presence, you will
never, surely you will never again know
the absolute pits of misery that you've known in your less spiritual days.
And yet it always surprises me, it always surprises me the depths of misery and failure
I can go to, no matter how high I have been in the Lord.
I like Simon Peter.
I make fun of him.
I'm going to have to apologize to him when I meet him in heaven,
but it's worth it.
I love to talk about him.
I think one reason that people like Simon Peter
and they talk so much about him
is because he's the reflection of everybody. All of us can identify with that fellow, and especially in this particular
circumstance. I believe if Simon Peter had ever sat down and said, I'm going to write a story
about what happened to me, I think he would have written it and called it surprised by failure,
surprised by misery, because he was totally surprised. Here, Jesus, with his
disciples the night he's betrayed, is giving them some last-minute instructions, and suddenly he
turns to Simon Peter, and he says, Simon, Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat.
He's going to take you and turn you inside out. He's going to harass and hassle you, and I prayed for you, and Peter said, not me,
Lord. No, Lord, I tell you what, these other fellows, they may deny you. They may deny that
they ever know you, but I want you to know something, Lord. I'm ready to go with you to
prison. I'm ready to go with you even to death. You can count on me. I understand you're having
some doubts about the rest of these fellows, but you can count on me. I will never leave you, nor forsake you, nor deny you.
And he meant it with all of his heart.
I don't think Peter was boasting.
I don't think he was trying to brag.
I think he was saying what was really in his heart.
I think Peter loved Jesus at that moment
as much as it was humanly possible for him to love Jesus.
But I want to tell you something.
I don't care how strong your love for Jesus is.
It can be temporarily overwhelmed at times.
Even a man like David, after God's own heart,
his love can be temporarily overwhelmed at times. Of course, I can understand why
Peter found it hard to believe that he was going to deny his Lord. Have you noticed the
context in which this grim prophecy occurs? I want you to look at verse 28. Jesus says
to his disciples, you are they who have stuck by me,
implying, of course, that others have forsaken him.
But you are the ones who have stuck by me in all my trials, all my tribulations.
And as a reward, I appoint unto you a kingdom,
even as my Father has appointed unto me,
that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Now, folks, that's heady stuff.
I mean, he's saying to these disciples,
you of all people have stuck by me.
You've been faithful.
And I'll tell you what I'm going to do.
I'm going to point unto you a kingdom just like my Father's going to point unto me.
You and I are going to sit together at my table in my kingdom,
and you boys are going to be sitting on the twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Oh, by the way, Peter,
before the night's out, you're going to deny that you know me three times. Well, you can see why
Peter found that so hard to follow. I mean, the transition is too swift. One minute he's a hero,
the next minute he's a zero. One minute Jesus has him sitting on a throne, and the next moment, he has him denying the Lord himself.
The transition was so swift.
How can you reconcile?
You see, this, and this is what Peter found
that's so difficult to understand.
How can you reconcile these two things?
How can you reconcile that here is a man
on the one hand who has stuck by Jesus
and is going to be given a kingdom
and is going to sit on a throne.
And at the same time,
he's going to curse and deny that he knows Jesus.
How can you reconcile those two people?
Well, the answer is you can't.
And that's why Peter found it so difficult to handle.
But I want us to concentrate tonight on the words that Jesus said to Peter.
Satan has desired to have you that he may sift you as wheat.
What I want to talk to you about tonight is sifted but saved.
There are three kinds of Christians in this building tonight.
There are those who have been sifted.
There are those who right now are being sifted.
And the third group is, watch out, brother, it's coming your way.
For sooner or later, in one degree or another,
all believers will experience what we can call,
what Jesus is calling, what I'm calling tonight,
the sifting by the devil. How the devil takes a
believer and tries to wrestle him loose from Jesus, harasses him, hassles him, turns him inside out,
shakes him, knocks him around, trying to shake him loose from his confidence and love in Jesus Christ.
And every believer, in one way or another, to some degree or another,
will experience this sifting process.
Now here we're calling it sifting.
Other places in the Bible it may be called chastisement or discipline or trials or tribulations. But here Jesus is putting it under the graphic picture of a sifting process.
And so let me just tonight share with you three important things about this matter of sifting.
And the first one is this, that Jesus Christ predicts that you and I will be sifted.
He predicts it.
Jesus sitting there in that group of disciples, and one moment he is encouraging them, and the next
moment he is saying, Satan has desired to have you, all of you, that he may sift you as wheat.
By the way, you know in John chapter 14, verse 1, that beautiful passage of Scripture,
let not your hearts be troubled, you believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house
are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told you.
I go and prepare a place for you.
And he goes on in that beautiful passage.
Have you ever read the last verses of chapter 13 of John?
It's the same story right here.
Same story right here.
Where Jesus, in one moment,
is predicting that Simon is going to deny him,
and then on the tail of that, he says,
but don't let your hearts be troubled.
I'm in charge of this.
I predict that it will happen,
but don't let your hearts be troubled
because I'm in charge.
The Lord predicts that the devil will sit with us.
I'm not going to take the time tonight
to prove there is a devil.
You are intelligent enough to know that there is an evil person,
a personality that goes under the various names of Lucifer and Satan and the devil.
But there is the devil who is trying his best to shake us loose from Jesus Christ.
And the Lord says that at times he comes to us to sift us.
Now, what I think would be helpful tonight
is to look at some of the strategies that the devil uses.
When Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, he said,
We are not ignorant of his devices, talking about the devil.
The word devices there means strategies or schemes.
In other words, the Bible is saying that Satan is a master strategist.
He doesn't just catch as catch can.
He plots, he plans, he knows how to operate.
And so he has his strategies. And Paul said to the Corinthians, we're not ignorant of those.
I'm not so certain Paul could say that today. I think in many ways we are ignorant of the
strategies of the devil, how he operates. But let me just suggest a few here. I think it will help us to be forearmed.
First of all, what is so obvious to me is that one of the strategies of the devil
is to strike us during periods of stress,
to attack us during moments of crisis,
when we're undergoing some unusual pressure in our life
and we are weakened emotionally by that pressure.
For instance, if you look at verse 24
where we began reading tonight,
the Bible says,
and there was also a strife among them
which should be accounted the greatest.
Now they were arguing.
Do you know what they were arguing about?
I tell you what, this is amazing.
Here is their Lord about to be crucified,
and He's been trying to get through to them
for a week that He's going to Jerusalem
and going to die.
They don't want to talk about it.
Every time Jesus brings up the cross,
they try to change the subject.
And even in this night,
it's obvious that the Lord is under great pressure
and His Spirit is troubled in Him. And you know what night, it's obvious that the Lord is under great pressure, and His Spirit
is troubled in Him. And you know what these disciples are arguing about? Which one of us
is going to take over when He's gone? That's exactly what they're arguing about. They're
arguing about which of them is the greatest, which of them is the most able, which of them is the
most worthy to take over if Jesus goes through this business of dying that he's talking about?
Now, can you imagine how anybody can be so insensitive?
Here is their Lord in the last moments of his life facing that horrible crucifixion.
And they're over here, instead of encouraging him and comforting him,
they're over here arguing about who's going to get the silverware when he's gone.
That type of thing.
And suddenly there was a strife
there was a strife
there was a tear
in the fabric of that fellowship
and that's all the devil was waiting
for that gave him
a foothold that gave
him an entree and when
that rip in the fellowship came
that's where the devil entered
and got hold of him
these men were under
terrific pressure. This was a stressful situation. This whole night had been unusual for these
disciples. As they met there in that upper room, Jesus was unusually solemn, and there was that
strange exchange between Judas and himself, and then Judas bolting out and going out into the night.
And Jesus talking about somebody betraying him.
There were clouds hanging over that whole situation.
They were on edge.
They were apprehensive.
Something was going on.
They didn't know what it was.
And they were edgy and irritable and jealous.
And suddenly there was a breakdown in their fellowship.
And that's what the devil used.
The devil is a dirty fighter. He likes to kick you when you're down.
There are times when you go through some difficulty and you say to yourself,
well, I'm going through so much now, I know God wouldn't let anything else happen.
And yet that seems to be the most opportune moment at times for the devil.
It may be some marital crisis you're in.
It may be some family crisis.
You may be heartbroken over a son or a daughter.
It may be financial.
It can be a thousand different things.
But for some reason, right now, you're undergoing unusual stress and pressure.
There is a crisis brewing in your life, and I want you to know something. That is the opportunity that the devil is looking for, to do his work in your life. Sometimes he attacks us before the
crisis to weaken us so that when we pass through it, we'll not be able to handle it. Sometimes he
attacks us right in the middle of the crisis. Sometimes He's waiting for us on the other side of it. You know, you've just come
through the crisis. You've just come through that great difficulty, and you breathe a sigh of relief.
You're so exhausted. You're emotionally drained, but thank God it's over. And at that moment of
weakness, that's when the devil strikes.
You know, you can see this so obviously in the Scripture.
I think about Elijah on Mount Carmel.
Boy, what a guy.
I mean, up there challenging those 450 prophets of Baal,
sticking his neck out, risking his life,
taunting their God, making fun of them.
And then he calls down fire from heaven
and chops the head off of those priests.
And well, you can take Elijah off your prayer list if you want to, because he doesn't need it
anymore. He has arrived. You don't need to worry about Elijah. If a man can handle Mount Carmel,
he can handle anything. But you turn the page and you see something. You see, you know what you see?
You see Elijah running for his life. Ran 90 miles to get away from a woman. And
as it turned out, ran in the wrong direction, actually. And you find him sitting under a
tree, feeling sorry for himself, wishing he were dead. I love what the angel says. The
angel says, what doest thou hear, O man of God? Didn't I see you
on Mount Carmel just a few hours ago? What are you doing here? After that tremendous conquest,
there is Elisha, the man of God, reduced to a whining, puny little man, wishing God would kill
him, which he didn't mean. Always when you get depressed, you say things you don't mean. He said,
God, I want you to just kill me. Elijah didn't want to die. If he'd wanted to die, he'd stayed right where he was. Jezebel
would have done it for him. But he's so confused. He's so mixed up. He doesn't know what he's doing.
But that's the way the devil operates. Take Simon Peter again for a minute. You remember over in
Matthew chapter 16, Jesus asked his disciples, who do people say that I am? And they said, well,
some say you're Elijah. Some say Jeremiah. But Jesus said, yeah, but who do people say that I am? And they said, Well, some say you're Elijah,
some say Jeremiah.
But Jesus said,
Yeah, but who do you say that I am?
Peter said,
Thou art the Christ,
the Son of the living God.
And Jesus was so thrilled
because Peter finally said something good and right.
And you know what He said?
He said,
Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and
blood has not revealed this unto you, but my Father which is in heaven. What a high moment.
What a terrifically high moment. Simon Peter has been the recipient of divine revelation that
nobody else up until that time had ever received. And the very next verse, practically Jesus is calling him the devil.
Get thee behind me, Satan, he says to Peter.
You don't understand the things of God.
Why can it change so fast?
Even it did so in the life of Jesus, actually.
There he was, baptized by John and Jordan.
He comes up out of the water,
and the heavens open,
and the Father says,
this is my beloved Son
in whom I am well pleased.
And the Spirit of God
descends upon him like a dove.
What a high moment.
And immediately the Spirit
drives him into the wilderness
to be tempted of the devil
forty days and forty nights.
So, what we need to understand
is that one of the strategies
of the enemy is to attack us during moments of stress and crisis.
But there's a second strategy here.
The devil attacks us at our strong points.
His strategy is to attack us at our strong points.
You say, wait just a minute, preacher.
I always thought that the devil would attack us at our weak points.
Well, that's right.
He does.
He always attacks us at our strong points, which are our weak points.
And they are weak because we think they're so strong we don't need to watch them.
Have you ever considered the point at which the devil got hold of simon peter
if i were to ask you tonight to draw up a profile of this fellow how would you describe him
i think lord douglas was right when he described simon peter as the big fisherman
and i have this i i have this image of simon peter as a as guy. I mean, he's got bulging muscles.
He's strong.
He's been out there on that Sea of Galilee all these years
hauling in those powerful nets of fishes.
And, well, I like to think of Simon Peter as the first redneck who ever lived.
That's, I think if Simon Peter were alive today,
he'd drive a pickup truck, wear cowboy boots and
a cowboy hat, have a rifle racket on the back of that pickup, and vote for George Wallace.
That's just the kind of fellow that Simon Peter is.
You know what Simon Peter's strength is?
You know what the strong point of Simon Peter is?
His strength, his courage. Why, when the soldiers came
in the Garden of Eden, I mean the Garden of Gethsemane, what did Simon do? He pulled out a
sword. He wasn't afraid to go after those soldiers. Oh no, that's his strong point. And Jesus said,
Simon, before the night's over, you're going to deny that you know me oh now wait just a minute Lord
wait just a minute
I know I'm not perfect
I know I have my weaknesses
but I'll tell you one thing Lord
I am not afraid
why Lord I'm not afraid of anything
there's only one thing that would cause me to deny you
and that's if I were afraid
but Lord listen that's my best point
that's the thing I afraid. But Lord, listen, that's my best point.
That's the thing I've got going for me most.
That's where my strength lies,
in the fact that I'm not afraid,
in the fact that I'm courageous.
And that's exactly where the devil got him.
Little girl at a fire says,
I think I saw you with him Peter says not me
in the last few years
we have been unfortunate enough
to view the sorry spectacle
of a lot of high profile religious leaders
not necessarily falling into sin
but being exposed to the sin they had long before fallen into.
I think to myself, well, I know I'm not perfect.
Boy, that's something I'd never do.
Have you ever said that?
Have you ever heard the story of somebody else and you say, well, I know I'm not perfect
and I know I have my faults
and boy, I tell you what,
that's one thing I wouldn't do.
You better watch out.
That may be the very one thing you do.
Paul said, those of you who think you stand
take heed lest you fall.
The scariest thing to me as a Christian and even more as a minister
is to realize how quickly, how quickly the devil can knock you off your pedestal.
And when you begin to think, well, I would never do something like it
I'll admit I'm not perfect
and I have my faults and I have my weaknesses
but boy I'd never do something like that
you better watch out
because that is exactly
the way it happens you think that that
area of your life is so strong
and so reinforced you don't worry about
it you see
therefore it leaves you vulnerable.
Well, then there's a third strategy.
And it is this, that the devil attacks strategic people.
Strategic people.
I want you to look at verses 31 and 32 for a moment.
And I want to show you something.
And the Lord said, Simon, Simon,
behold, Satan has desired to have you. Now the word you there is plural. It doesn't necessarily show it in the English, but it's plural. He says, Simon, Simon. He singles Simon Peter out. He
draws him aside and he says, Simon, I want you to know something. Satan has desired to
have all of you disciples, that he may sift all of you disciples as wheat. In verse 32, he goes back
to the singular, but I have prayed for thee, singular, that thy faith, singular, fail not, and when you,
singular, are converted, you, singular, convert your brethren, strengthen your brethren. Now,
did you notice it? Jesus calls Peter aside, and he says, Peter, listen, the devil wants all of you,
the whole bunch of you, to sift his wheat. But Peter, I have singled you out, and I'm praying
for you especially, so that your faith especially won't fail. And so that when you especially get back on your feet,
you especially will be able to minister to your brethren.
Now I ask myself a question,
why did Jesus single Peter out?
The answer is because the devil had singled him out.
You know why?
Because Peter was the leader of that band of disciples.
You don't have to study very hard in the Gospels
to realize that he was the unofficial leader of that whole band,
that they followed him.
You remember after the resurrection, Peter was sitting around,
he said, I'm going fishing.
And there he doesn't necessarily mean I'm just going for a day.
Most scholars think he means I'm going back to fishing. I'm going back to my old trade, I'm going fishing. And there he doesn't necessarily mean I'm just going for a day. Most scholars think he means I'm going back to fishing. I'm going back to my old trade.
I'm going fishing. And the rest of the disciples said, well, wait just a minute. We'll go with you.
They just followed Peter. That's the way they were. I'm convinced that if Simon Peter had not
denied and fled from his Lord that night, none of the other disciples would have either.
But you see, the devil is a master strategist, and he knew that Simon was the key to getting the rest of them.
That those other fellows gained such strength from Simon Peter that if he fell, the rest of them would be easy pickings.
And that's the way it works.
I can tell you tonight who the devil's number one target is in this church, and it's your
pastor sitting over here, and then the rest of the leaders of the church.
As a matter of fact, when Simon Peter himself years later is writing his first epistle,
and in the fifth chapter he warns the people to be on the lookout for the devil, he's addressing
himself to the elders of the church, to the leaders of the church.
Why is that?
I'll tell you.
It's because no church will ever rise above the spiritual level of its leadership.
It'll never rise above the spiritual level of its leadership it'll never rise above
the spiritual level of its pastor it may not rise that high but it'll never rise
above it now that's not to say that there won't be individuals within that
leader within that church that may far far at strip the pastor in their
spirituality I know that when I was a pastor there was always somebody in that
church who knew more about walking with God than I'll ever know.
But I do know this, that as a body, as an institution,
as a corporate group, that church as a whole never rose above my own spiritual level.
It never will.
Because when God calls a man to be a pastor,
God works through that pastor.
That pastor becomes the means whereby God's blessings flow into that church,
and therefore that church can be blessed no more than the pastor himself is blessed.
A church will never rise above the spiritual level of its leadership.
It never will.
And if the devil wants to defeat Sherwood Baptist Church,
all it has to do is to defeat the pastor and to defeat the leadership.
And that's all it needs to do.
I often wonder how much pressure Billy Graham must be under.
Can you imagine tonight, can you imagine tonight how many thousands, millions of people
would be devastated if Billy Graham fell?
Don't you know the devil has zeroed in on him
all these years?
Well, I'm glad I'm not Billy Graham.
I'm glad I'm not a pastor. I'm glad I'm not a leader.
I'm not anybody important. Therefore, I'm not a target of the devil. Oh, is that right?
Do you mean to tell me that there's nobody you have influence over you see the
truth of the is that you and I influence somebody whether we know it or not she
stopped for a moment and think can you think of some friend some Christian that
you admire that you draw strength from and if somehow you found out tonight
they were phony,
that it wouldn't just about wreck you,
devastate you.
Everybody, there's a key to me.
Somebody out there
is somebody that I draw strength from,
and they, in one sense,
are the key to my own spiritual life. And if they fail,
then I may fail too. Do you have influence over, say, like a son or a daughter? Do you have
influence over, say, like a husband or wife or mother or father? The devil always knows how to get to this person over here, and sometimes the best way
is to get at this one, and when he gets this one, the rest of them will be easy pickings.
That's the strategy of the enemy. First of all, Christ predicts that he will sift us. Now,
number two, I've got some good news and bad news for you.
The good news is
that the devil can't lay a finger on you
without divine permission.
That's good news.
Don't ever let anybody tell you
that the devil is as strong as God.
Dualism is one of the oldest heresies in the church
and without knowing it,
many times we practice it
by ascribing to the devil powers he does not have.
I want you to know that the devil cannot lay a finger on anybody
without divine permission.
That's the good news.
The bad news is he gets divine permission to do it.
That's exactly what Jesus is saying.
Satan has desired to have you.
Not only does the Lord predict that we will be sifted,
he even permits it for heaven's sake.
Satan has desired to have you.
That word translated desire literally means to obtain by asking,
to obtain by asking permission.
It's almost a word of prayer.
It's almost as if the devil was praying to Jesus and said,
I want to take hold of Simon
and sift him as wheat. And Jesus said, I give you permission to do it. That's exactly what happened.
And boy, that raises a big question in my mind. Why would he give the devil permission?
He knew what was going to happen. He knew Peter would never be able to pass that test.
He knew what was going to happen.
Why? Why?
Why would he do that?
I tell you, if the devil came to me tonight
and said, listen, I want to take your son
and I want to take your daughter
and I want to sift them as wheat,
I want to shake them loose,
I want to harass them,
but I need your permission to do it.
Do you think I'd give him my permission?
Of course not. Not on your life. Most of you I don't know. But I do know this, that if
the devil came to me and said he wanted to sift you, but he needed my permission to do
it, I wouldn't give him permission to sift you even though I don't know you. Well, I
guess that means I love my children more than God loves them. I guess that means I love my children more than God loves them
I guess that means I love you more than God loves you
well I know that can't be true
so there has to be another explanation
I tell you what I worried over this for a long time
why in the world would the Lord give the devil permission
to sift me when he knows that I'm not going to be able to pass the test
and then it just occurred
to him, it's as plain as day. I don't see why I ever worried about it. There are two reasons why
the Lord permits the devil to sift us. Number one, because we need it. Not just that simple. We need
it. You know what sifting is, don't you? It's when they take wheat and they flash it and shake it,
separating it from the chaff, from the dirt.
In other words, if you're going to be wheat, you're going to have to be sifted.
It goes with the territory.
It's the nature of wheat that it requires sifting.
If it's ever to be made into life-giving food, it has to be sifted.
And the reason the Lord permitted Simon to be sifted is because Simon
needed it boy did he ever need it Simon had a lot of chaff in him I'll tell you
anybody that will stand toe-to-toe with Jesus Christ and say Lord you're wrong
about me that fella has real problems pride, stubbornness.
The devil comes to Jesus and says,
I sure would like to sift him.
Jesus said, sounds a pretty good idea to me.
That's what Simon needs is a good old swift sifting.
Help yourself.
Go right ahead.
But,
what you don't understand, devil,
is that I know what you're wanting to do.
You're wanting to destroy the good so that nothing but the bad remains.
Well, I'm going to let you sift him all right.
But I'm going to watch over that whole process
and I'm going to superintend it
so that it's just the bad that is destroyed
and only the good remains.
That's why.
And there are times when you and I force God to sift us.
I don't believe the Lord prefers to sift us.
I think He prefers to sift us through the Word of God.
In John 15, He said,
You are purged and cleansed through the Word that I have spoken unto you.
I believe as long as I'm receptive and responsive to the Word of God
and the convicting power of the Holy Spirit,
and I allow the Word of God to cleanse my life and humble me and purify me.
But I think if I become so stubbornly rebellious,
and I ignore the Word of God, and I ignore the convicting power of the Holy Spirit, I think I come to the place where God has
no choice but to allow the devil to sift me. I think it's a last resort. But I want you to know
something. If you're saved, if you're saved, God is willing to do whatever it takes to make you like Jesus.
And if it takes sifting, so be it. Don't ever confuse compassion with sentimentality.
God is a compassionate God, but he's not sentimental. Now, I'll tell you the difference
between being sentimental and being compassionate.
It's when your little kid
needs to have a spanking
and you can't bear to do it.
You just look into those big
old brown eyes. You know
he didn't mean it to begin with.
And you just can't bear it.
And so you don't
instruct him.
You don't discipline him. You don't discipline him.
You know what that is?
That's being sentimental.
You know what compassion is?
Loving him so much
that you're willing to spank him
to see that he grows right.
It's a lot easier not to discipline a child
than it is to discipline a child.
That's compassion.
And whatever it takes, God is going to see to it.
Either through the Word and the Spirit,
or either through the devil's harassment of my life,
God is going to see to it that I grow into the image of Jesus Christ.
So, he sifts us for this reason, because we need it.
The second reason the Lord
permits us to be sifted
is because others need it.
Now, when I say others need it,
I don't mean that others themselves
need to be sifted.
I mean that others need you to be sifted.
Listen to what Jesus says in that 32nd verse. He said,
and when thou art converted, he said, I prayed for you that your faith fail not. You said his
faith did fail. No, his faith didn't fall, didn't fail. His love did. His courage did,
but not his faith. Jesus said, and when you are converted, and the word there literally means
when you get back on your feet, when you regain your balance, when you regain your equilibrium,
I want you to do what?
Strengthen your brothers.
Same word used of the Holy Spirit
as being a comforter, a paraclete,
an encourager, a minister.
Here's what he's saying.
Simon Peter, when you get through this process,
you'll be qualified to minister to your brothers.
Right now, you're not fit to minister to anybody. You're in such a sorry shape of yourself. But, he said, when you
get through this, you'll be able to strengthen others. I believe that there are times when the
Lord permits us to be sifted, not because of some sin in our life, not because of some stubborn rebellion in our life,
but because God wants to use us
to minister to other people,
to strengthen other people.
And I tell you, I don't recall
God ever taking me through and my wife through
anything in our lives
that sooner or later
somebody didn't come across our path
that needed to know what we learned
by that experience.
It's like digging a well in the desert
so that the next fellow coming along
will be able to get some water.
I think there are some of us
in this room tonight
that will live out our lives
and die without ever understanding why certain difficulties, why certain tragedies came into
our lives. We'll never understand it, never know, until we stand in His presence. And
then I believe that we will see the explanation in the lives of other people.
What I mean by this is that I think sometimes
the tears I shed water the flowers
in somebody else's garden.
I think sometimes the gold that my suffering earns
is deposited into the account of somebody else.
You know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying?
You know what I'm saying?
Others need us to be sifted.
They need
us to be put through
the trials. Why? So
that there'll be somebody around
to encourage them
and strengthen them and
minister to them.
Well, one final word.
Not only does the Lord predict it and permit it,
but here's the best part.
He protects us in it.
He protects us in it.
Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you
that he may sift you as wheat,
but I have prayed for you.
I'm glad he told him ahead of time, aren't you?
He could have come up after us all over and said,
Peter, I know you're pretty worried there,
but I had it all together.
I'd prayed for you.
No, he told him ahead of time.
I believe he told him ahead of time
so that while Peter was going through
that whirlpool of torment,
maybe the words of Jesus echoing in his ear,
but I have prayed for thee,
but I have prayed for thee.
And if you ever get back,
no, He didn't say that, did He?
He didn't say, and if you are converted.
He said, when you get back on your feet,
I have prayed for you.
It's a settled thing.
It's a done deal.
I have prayed for you. It's going to be all right. And when you get back on your feet, I want you to know
something. You'll be able to strengthen others. The Lord Jesus protected Simon Peter. How did
he do it? He did it by his intercession. And even though the Lord permits the devil to take us
and to sift us so that we ourselves can be purified, so that we ourselves
can strengthen others. Yet, ever before we go through that process, the Lord Jesus has already
sealed our protection by His intercession. I believe in intercession. I think that you can
tell at times when people are praying for you. Martin Luther said one day, he said,
I feel so good today somebody must be praying for me.
I'll never forget the first time that I was ever consciously aware
of somebody actually interceding for me as a preacher.
It was in Little Rock, Arkansas.
I was still in seminary.
I was preaching a revival meeting in a church in Little Rock, Arkansas.
It was the deadest meeting I think I'd ever been in in my life. I mean, well, you had to say dead
with two syllables to really do it right. It was dead. I mean, it was dead. It was the deadest
thing. Oh, nobody seemed to care. The pastor didn't care. The services were lifeless and dead.
And I want to tell you something. Did you know you can backslide right while you're preaching a revival meeting? You surely can. I've done it. I said to them, I said, well,
they don't care. I don't care. I mean, it's their church. Pastor doesn't seem to care.
Nobody else cares. Why should I care? I'm not going to worry about it. So all I would do is
just preach my little sermon, get back to the motel and forget about it. It's dead. Terrible. Well, Saturday night,
I came to the church, and I was walking up the sidewalk, and I heard somebody call my name.
And I looked up, and parked out in front of the church was a black Nash Rambler station wagon.
Do you remember, do you remember those? Some of you old enough to remember those old Nash Rambler station wagons.
And it was parked out there at the
curb. It was my wife's grandmother,
Mrs. Cook.
And that was
her black Rambler station wagon.
And she was parked out there at the curb.
And she was calling me.
And most of me come over.
So I went over there, and I went
over there, and when I got there, it wasn't just Mrs. Cook, it was two other elderly ladies.
These three elderly women were all scrunched together in the front seat of that little Nash Rambler station wagon.
I don't know why to this day, why they're all sitting in the front seat.
Because, you see, these women were, well, these women were not thin women, you see.
And they were all scrunched together in the front seat of that little rambler station wagon.
And I went over there, and I spoke to Mrs. Cook, and I said, yeah, what do you want?
And she reached out and grabbed me and almost pulled me into that car.
And she said, young man, we just want you to know
that while you're in there preaching tonight,
there's going to be three old ladies
out here in this car praying for you.
Do you think that made a difference?
That's the first time I consciously ever remember
somebody actually interceding for me
while I was preaching.
And I could feel it.
And I was different.
And all the time I was preaching, you know what I kept seeing in my mind?
I kept seeing three old women scrunched together in the front seat of a Rambler station wagon,
praying for me.
Praying for me, it makes a difference.
In 1975, on Thanksgiving Day,
our oldest son died.
He was 18.
And those of you who've had losses like that,
you understand it.
The wound never heals.
It does stop bleeding.
But you have to get through a couple of birthdays.
You need to get through a couple of Christmases
to where you can handle it.
Well, he died on Thanksgiving Day.
His birthday is on October the 13th,
and I looked ahead and I realized that that would be a tough day.
You know, I knew that had to be tough.
The first birthday after he died, I knew that was going to be tough.
And I saw that I was going to be somewhere in Georgia in a revival meeting on that day, and I didn't want to be there. And I didn't want my wife to be home without me on
that day, because I knew it was going to be an awful day. And so I called the pastor, and I
explained to him the situation, and he graciously allowed me to cancel the meeting. And so when
October the 13th rolled around that week, I was at home instead of off in a meeting where everybody thought I would be. And Kay and I dreaded that week when it was going to be a terrible
week. And all Sunday and Monday and Tuesday, we just dreaded Wednesday. Oh, I know Wednesday's
going to be terrible. Don't think I can take it. Birthday came on Wednesday that year.
Got up that morning and surprisingly it didn't seem all that bad.
As a matter of fact, pretty good day.
I was surprised.
Kay was surprised.
And we remarked to each other several times throughout the day,
I would never have believed we could have handled this like we're handling.
Just amazed.
About 5, 5.30, we got Steve and Kim,
and we went out to the cemetery, stood around Ronnie's grave,
sang a little hymn, had a time of prayer,
then went to prayer meeting.
Walked in on that Wednesday night, nobody expecting me to be there, thinking I was out of town.
And a woman saw us come in and she rushed over and she said, Brother Dunn, I thought you were away this week. I said, no, I'm here. And she said, oh, I'm glad that you're here.
She said, I need to ask you a question. What's been going on with you? Of course, she had no
idea the significance of that day, you see. She said, has this day, has there been something
special about this day? And I said, well, why do you ask? She said, well, early this morning,
early this morning, I woke up with you and your family on my heart. And she said, you know,
it's the beatenest thing, but all day long, all I've been able to do is just to pray for you
and your family. And I thought you must be going through some big decision or something
because God was just really having me to pray for you. She said, I want to know what was so
special about that day. And I turned to Kay and we smiled pray for you. And she said, I want to know what was so special about that day.
And I turned to Kay and we smiled at each other
and suddenly we understood why that day was such a good day.
Now I want to tell you something, folks.
I thank God for three old women who will scrunch together
in the front seat of a rambler station wagon
to pray for a young preacher.
And I praise God for sensitive people
like that dear woman in that church
who would pray my family through a day of agony.
But you know what thrills me more than anything else?
To know that right now,
that there is one seated at the right hand of the Father
who is praying for me right now at this moment.
Thank God for the intercession of those
others, but thank God tonight for the intercession of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, I have prayed
for thee. And I want you to know something. The Lord will never send you down any path that he hasn't already prayed over as a matter of fact
when you and I walk we walk on prayed over ground the Lord always will
precede you down the path and cover it with prayer for he ever liveth to make intercession for us. He protects us in the midst of a sifting.
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