You have a far brighter future than you may imagine. You can see great changes in your life. You can overcome your past failures and mistakes. You can become a great success and a powerful leader. This is what can happen when you experience Jesus Christ in a personal way and become trained as one of His true followers.
Jesus ministered to great multitudes of people and saw many healings and miracles. But He spent most of his time forming the character and developing the capacities of a diverse group of personalities. The training of His team of 12 ordinary men was central to His mission and essential to the continuation of His ministry.
Although one betrayed him and was replaced, it was this team of 12 who stood together on the Day of Pentecost when the Christian community began its rapid expansion in the first century. And it was a former fisherman called Peter who was the spokesman and leader of the group.
Peter was brought to Jesus by his brother Andrew (Matthew 4:18-20). Soon he was not only part of an inner core group of the 12, but was also regarded as the leader of the group. In each list of the disciples in the gospels and in Acts 1:13, Peter is always mentioned first. We know more of Peter than any other disciple in the different gospel accounts.
And it is from these accounts that we get a very clear example of how Jesus trained His disciples. We need to understand this because Jesus called His first disciples, as He calls us as Christians today, to ‘go and make disciples in all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you’ (Matthew 28:19-20).
Now we need to understand Christians are born or born again by the Spirit of God working in our lives, but disciples are formed. Jesus made this clear when He called Peter and Andrew to leave their fishing nets and follow Him. Matthew 4:19 records that Jesus said, “Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of people.” Being made into fishers of people meant developing them through an intentional process to become what God intended them to become.
Training is essential in any walk of life, and it is just the same if you are serious about growing in your Christian life and leadership. That’s why the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 11: ‘follow me as I follow Christ.’ And that’s why he was able to form people like Timothy and Titus into great leaders.
To help us excel as disciples and disciple makers we should be wise to learn from how Jesus trained his team of 12 and more specifically by focussing on how Jesus formed Peter into a great disciple and leader.
1. Jesus was prepared to shape someone who needed a lot of shaping (Matthew 17:3-5; Luke 5:5; Matthew 16:21-22)
2. Jesus gave Peter a strong vision for his life (Luke 6:14; Matthew 16:18)
3. Jesus constantly challenged and confronted Peter (Matthew 16:23; Hebrews 12:11)
4. Jesus prayed for Peter (John 17:6-19; Luke 22:31-32)
5. Jesus restored Peter (John 21)
Apply
1. Jesus was prepared to shape someone who needed a lot of shaping: Why did Jesus spend so much time and effort with Peter? One reason was because Peter needed a lot of help. Peter was a strong character, a very rough diamond. His character flaws were many and often clear for all to see.
- He was impulsive: He was quick to jump out of the boat on the stormy sea of Galilee and try to walk on water like Jesus.
- He often spoke without thinking: On the mount of transfiguration when the great figures of Moses and Elijah appeared and spoke with Jesus, he just thought he would weigh in with some helpful comments, so Father God had to tell him to stop speaking (Matthew 17:3-5).
- He was blunt and direct: When Jesus told the disciples to throw their nets on the other side of the boat, Peter wanted to make it clear to Jesus, the carpenter from Nazareth, they were only doing it because he was asking them to (Luke 5:5). In other words he felt free to verbalise his scepticism and reluctance.
- He was arrogant and rude: He saw himself as superior to the other disciples declaring that if everyone left Jesus for sure he would remain. He felt at liberty to opening disagree with Jesus and even giving him a telling off (Matthew 16:21-22). Here was a man who didn’t know how to respect boundaries.
- He was aggressive: In the garden of Gethsemane where Judas had arrived with a group of soldiers and officials to arrest Jesus, Peter was quick to pull out his sword and took a swing at the head of Malchus, the servant of the high priest. He missed decapitating him but managed to cut off his ear, which Jesus quickly healed.
- He failed totally at the moment when he should have stepped up: Despite his big boasts, Peter’s weakness and fear overcame him when Jesus was arrested. He used some very bad language as he denied the Lord three times and then wept bitterly over his failure.
Peter was in his time of formation, a very rough, outspoken and erratic character, not your ideal candidate for Christian leadership, you may think. He had many good points, but his failures seemed to outnumber them. How many of these traits can you identify with? Your failures and mistakes need not disqualify you from being raised up to serve the Lord. Just as Jesus determined to form this far from perfect man into a great leader, so He wants you to be formed into His likeness. And he wants every disciple maker to accept the challenge of shaping up disciples who may need a lot of shaping.
2. Jesus gave Peter a strong vision for his life: From the beginning, Jesus spoke strong words of affirmation over Peter. He wanted him to visualize his future, not focus on his past. He wanted him to know that he was being trained up to have a far more fulfilling and fruitful life than just catching fish. He would bring many men and women into the kingdom of God. And Jesus wanted him to have a very strong and positive perception of his own identity in the kingdom of God. His name was Simon but Jesus also named him Peter (Luke 6:14). It was like a nickname. Coming from the Greek word petros (or the Aramaic word “Cephas”), the name Peter means “Rock” or “Stone.” Although Peter at times seemed to be all over the place in his emotions, actions and reactions, he knew that the Lord had marked him out as a rock who could be depended on (Matthew 16:18). He would become a bedrock of the church and an unshakeable, immovable leader. In time He became what Jesus had declared his identity to be. Whether you are forming someone in your family or the church family, always speak possibilities over your disciples. Always cast vision for what they can be. Always declare God has great dreams for them and encourage them to discover them.
3. Jesus constantly challenged and confronted Peter: No other disciple was as corrected as much as Peter and it was often done in the context of the group. Peter so often said the wrong thing at the wrong time, notably when he tried out of sentiment and personal affection to stop Jesus going to the cross. This earned a fierce rebuke from Jesus, as it conflicted with the whole reason Jesus had come into the world (Matthew 16:23). Now it is not recommended to use such language in forming disciples but for anyone to be trained, the trainer or parent must be caring and courageous enough to correct and the trainee/ apprentice/disciple must be prepared to accept correction with a humble attitude. By definition, to be a disciple means to be a learner. So be willing to accept correction and move forward (Hebrews 12:11).
4. Jesus prayed for Peter: Of course, Jesus prayed for all his disciples (John 17:6-19). He prayed for their protection and their unity that they would be filled with joy and kept holy through the truth of God’s word. But Jesus also prayed specifically for Peter, who He knew would be targeted by Satan and tempted to give up (Luke 22:31-32). How we need to pray for everyone we are trying to help and form for Christ, especially our family members and disciples. And such prayers will be answered as it was in the case of Peter.
5. Jesus restored Peter: Jesus never gave up on Peter. Even after his failures, when Peter had gone back fishing after his denials and all the dark events of the crucifixion, Jesus came looking for him. John 21 tells how he invited him to a memorable talk over breakfast by the Lake of Galilee. He asked Peter three times if he loved Him, giving him the opportunity to cancel out his three denials, and then Jesus recommissioned him three times instructing him ‘to feed my sheep.’ And then, not long after Jesus returned to heaven and left them to carry on his work. Soon everyone saw that the investment of Jesus in Peter was far from wasted. Weeks later on the Day of Pentecost, Peter, with the 11 other disciples standing side by side in strong support, preached a powerful message of repentance and restoration. Three thousand people were added to the church that very day. Peter then led the way in working miracles just as Jesus had. He slept peacefully in prison the night before he was due to be executed just as he had seen Jesus sleep in the storm. He opened up the good news of the gospel to the Gentiles when he went to the home of the roman centurion Cornelius. Above all Peter was a changed man. John MacArthur in his book ‘Twelve Ordinary Men’ highlights how Peter had learned to be submissive, humble and teachable. He became self-controlled and full of love, as his later letters made clear. And he lost his fear, courageously preaching the gospel and finally, according to the records of early church history, asking to be crucified upside down as he wasn’t worthy to die as his Lord had died.
If you are an unreconstructed Peter, so conscious of your faults and failings, there is hope for you. And if you are a disciple maker, don’t ever give up with people, even if they are very difficult customers. For your investment in them may well prove to be the most fulfilling and far-reaching thing you have ever done.
