Br. Curtis Almquist

Confession of Peter

Acts 4:8-13

In the calendar of the church we remember today the confession of Peter. We could ask, which confession, because we know of at least three confessions. We learn in this Gospel lesson appointed for today that Peter was the first of Jesus’ followers to confess Jesus as the Messiah. So it is, the word “confession” is a declaration of what someone knows to be true. Peter makes a confession of faith, a personal affirmation.[i]

But then comes Peter’s repudiation. After having traveled the way with Jesus throughout Galilee, having witnessed and shared in Jesus’ closest confidences and in his miraculous ministry, Peter stands with his fellow disciples while Jesus is being crucified. Peter is identified as a companion of Jesus, which Peter publicly denies. Peter confesses that he does not even know Jesus.[ii] Peter feigns to simply be a spectator. So we have Peter’s two discordant confessions: first an affirmation, then a repudiation.

In the end we witness Peter’s confession of guilt implicit in his meeting up with Jesus along the Sea of Galilee following his resurrection.[iii]  This leads to Peter’s reconciliation and restoration when Peter confesses, confesses again and again, that he knows and loves Jesus.[iv]

Jesus chose to build his church upon Peter’s leadership, not because Peter was so strong – strong though he was – but because Peter was also so weak. Pathetically weak, ultimately a broken man, in great need. Peter’s brokenness became Jesus’ real breakthrough to him… which is where all of us figure into this Gospel story: how Jesus knows us and can use us. Michael Ramsey, sometime Archbishop of Canterbury, said that “the strength of the Church is… the strength of Christ who forgives us, humbles us, and can do something with us. So no one is excluded who is ready to [confess], ‘I am sorry. God help me, a sinner.’ In the final crisis all that Saint Peter could say was, ‘I am sorry,’ and Christ made him the rock man of the Church.”[v]

i] John 1:20; Hebrews 11:13; 1 John 4:2f.

[ii] Matthew 26:69-75, Mark 14:66-72, Luke 22:54-62, and John 18:15-18, 25-27.

[iii] Matthew 3:6; Mark 1:5; Acts 19:18; James 5:16; 1 John 1:9.

[iv] John 21:15-25.

[v] Michael Ramsey in The Christian Priest Today (2009).