Luke 22:31-34--Jesus Foretells Peter's Denial

Luke 22:31-34
English Standard Version
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Jesus Foretells Peter's Denial
31 “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, 32 but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.” 33 Peter said to him, “Lord, I am ready to go with you both to prison and to death.” 34 Jesus said, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster will not crow this day, until you deny three times that you know me.”

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During the Last Supper, Jesus tells the disciples that it is time is upon them for Him to be betrayed, and that one of them will be the one to betray Him (speaking of Judas), but in a way, all of them will participate in this betrayal because all of them will abandon Him in His time of need--only John and Peter will come back to witness the trial, and Peter will run away in shame after denying Jesus three times during the trial.  John alone will remain at the foot of the cross along with Mary's mother and the other women for Jesus to entrust Mary and His family to John for He did not entrust them even to his other brothers who would later write epistles of the New Testament, but at this point they did not believe who Jesus said He was.  They would only believe Him after the Resurrection.

Now Jesus warns Peter that Satan has requested to sift Peter.  Notice that Satan could not touch Peter without Jesus' permission because Peter belonged to Jesus in much the same way that Satan had to go to God to ask for permission in the book of Job to touch Job's possessions and family and then finally to touch Job himself--but God even put constraints on that so as to be able to touch Job's health, but not to be able to take his life.  Jesus says that He has prayed for Peter so that his faith would not fail in the midst of this trial, which presumes that Jesus has given Satan permission.

Jesus already knew the outcome that Peter was going to deny Him three times and that Satan would look at this is a victory that one so close to Jesus has failed, and this was not only an attack on Peter, but an attack on Jesus, which I think is probably what Satan wanted more than anything out of this.  Satan wishes to injure God by using those whom God has called "friends of God."  We would expect those of the world to do things to injure God, but what about when those wounds come from those He was about to lay down His life for?  If this was the kind of person Jesus was dying for, were they worth it?  Would this perhaps be enough to make Jesus think twice about going to the cross?  I think that's what Satan wanted to get out of this.

Peter being bold and brash says that he would never deny Jesus even if everyone else was unfaithful, he would be faithful.  Then he swore with an oath that he would go to prison with Jesus and die alongside Jesus, and all the others chimed in and did the same.  I already told you that all of them ran when Jesus was betrayed and arrested.  Jesus looks straight at Peter and tells Him, "Peter, the rooster will not crow this day, until you deny three times that you know me.”  This cut Peter to the quick as Peter had just made a great statement of swearing his allegiance to Jesus and Jesus not only said "I don't believe you," but also said, "You will betray me."  And this betrayal probably hurt Jesus as much or more than the betrayal of Judas--at least Jesus knew Judas was a traitor from the beginning of His ministry and chose Judas for that reason.  He knew Judas was "a devil" and "a traitor," but Peter had been like a brother to Jesus.  The wounds that come from a close friend cut more deeply and it is much harder to repair that kind of damage--I think that was also Satan's goal here.  Maybe he hoped by this to make Peter feel he had failed so badly that he was somehow disqualified from the race set before him, and he stopped running the race and just gave up.

We'll see how this all plays out over the next couple of chapters, but Peter will also have a lot to say about being faithful to Jesus in His epistles.  It seems like this event will stick with him for his entire life and that it was something that he hoped that no one ever repeated.  We still see Peter being bold and courageous after the coming of the Holy Spirit, but we don't see him being quite so braggadocios as he is here and a few other places in the Gospels.  God does a real work in him to transform Him.