APR 13 2025 | Road to the Cross: The Upper Room S1E4 | Crowing for Grace

Sea Change Church · APR 13 2025 | Road to the Cross: The Upper Room S1E4 - Crowing for Grace
John 13:36-38
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

And then the final point is there is grace beyond the rooster's crow. We all know the story of the rooster's crow. We'll get to that. Let's go to the first point. Unchecked zeal burns hot, but often burns out. Go to verse 37. Peter said to him, Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you. There's that now word. We saw that last week.

He wants to do something that's beyond him in the moment. I put Peter had the fire, but not yet the foundation. His devotion was real, but it was untested. Jesus lived in a time of the zealots. Zealot is a word that means, the Greek word is zelotes. It's zelotes is the word, and you'll see it in the Bible. Jesus was surrounded by Jewish zealots, and that was a term that came around the first century, who wanted to take over the Roman Empire.

It is believed that these zealots were forming underground cabals that were trying to have a basically some kind of takeover of some kind, and they saw Jesus as the next great hope. Others had come before him, and someone like Judas Iscariot was a zealot. It is a thought that perhaps Ascari, there was a group called the Ascari that were zealots, that he was one of the originators of that group, of these zealots.

And so when he saw Jesus, he thought, yes, my political hero is here. And he got excited, and he came in burning hot. But he was disappointed when Jesus proved more faithful than he did a political king, more faithful to God's message and going to the cross. So he was surrounded by these zealots. Jesus, in Luke 16, it talks about one of these zealots.

We'll just talk about one of the zealots that followed him. He was followed by lots of zealots. Luke 6.15, when he was talking about who he was followed by, he was followed by Matthew Thomas, James, son of Alvius, and Simon, who was called the Zealot. Now, you're pretty zealous if your name is like Ted the Zealot, right? And so Jesus is being followed by all these zealots.

Zelotes is this word. The word Zelotes means boiler. It means you're boiling over. This is where we get the word jealous from. Have you ever been jealous, zealous, jealous? It comes from that root word. And we see that Peter burned hot like this. When I got to Point Loma Nazarene College at the time, not university at the time, I've told this story.

I had been living this radical life. I'd grown up in the church, in the Catholic church, and then in sixth grade, I got into Protestant youth group at Skyline Wesleyan. It was just amazing. One week in the Catholic church, one week at Skyline, 300 kids in the youth group, which was huge for the 1980s. And so I was getting this incredible balance of just sitting there with my dad in Catholic church and then going to the other thing.

And I had been a believer, but I fell off. And I had about a three-year period that was rough, and I've talked about that period. When I finally got to Point Loma Nazarene, I've told this story many times. Some of you are new, so I'm going to retell it because this is a bit of a testimony. I had gotten drunk in Mexico and passed out in the gutter.

And my friend carried me home, and the next day, Point Loma Nazarene started. And so they had gotten in. I had cheated on my SAT. My friend took my SAT test for me. Not a lie. John Moynes. I got a 1540, which was really high. Phenomenal. This guy has Fs. He must be one of those kids who's just really smart that's bored with school, is what they thought.

So it's true. Excuse me, 1340, not 1540. Sorry. So I went there, and it was interesting. The night I went there, and the day you started, you had to sign a contract. I don't know if they still have to do it, where you say you won't drink. And I was still smelling like a fifth of vodka at the point. And so I signed this thing. And that was the last night.

That was the last night I ever drank. And I signed it. And I didn't leave Point Loma for basically six months. They're like, hey, that's a Christian bubble. I needed a bubble, yes. And I rededicated my life at Jesus at that time. And I needed to find something that was as radical as what I was doing. Because I couldn't just have this manby-pamby, like, go to church and just sit there.

I had to be radical. And all of a sudden, Jesus took hold of me. I became a zealot. Like, a little zealot. I went and got a karate, you know, they call them a gi outfit. You know, those white outfits you wear. And I had a shirt that had Romans. It says, you know, I'm not ashamed of the gospel. I'd wear that. I grew my hair super long. I wore white all the time.

I was down, like, I'm not kidding. I was down at OB. And I was, like, feeding the homeless. We started working and, like, helping the prostitutes down on rose crayons and giving them food and helping them to get medical care if they needed it. It was radical. It was like a year. It was a lot of ups and downs. Thank God I didn't fall off. I kind of, you know, I think we found some through the turbulence of that.

But I was definitely a zealot at that point. Maybe not the same kind as Peter. But what I found is this. The zeal never lasted. I would get to these points and all of a sudden I would end. And this is where I've landed. I'm 55 now. I'm a long way from the gi. Is that we're saved by faith, not by zeal. And if you are a person who's regularly having ups and downs, you have these huge moments.

I've learned to really not trust the zealotry in my life and the zeal. I like it, right? It's a good fuel. Zeal is an incredible fuel. It'll get you out of bed in the morning. It'll get you doing all these things. But what I have found is I can't trust it. And if I had to choose a group of people, if I could choose somebody who has a ton of zeal, they show up hot.

Now, I would probably rather choose somebody who's boring and faithful. Pastor Mark, from my old pastor where I used to work, said to me, he goes, you know, people come into the church sometimes and they come in super hot. And they're like, oh, I love your church. You're the best pastor I've ever heard. And I love your church. We've never been in a church like this.

And I was at a church before and then they'd go off on their old church. And then they'd tell you all about it. He goes, the hotter they come in, I found out the hotter they leave. He says, you will never know if a person is faithful until you get through conflict with them. He says, until I have a, he goes, I don't try to create conflict. But until you get through conflict, then you know who's going to stick around.

And we see that with Peter. Peter was set up for a failure. This is just the word on this one point before we get to this part about grace. Check your zeal at the door. Remember, I would say also when you're in these moments of incredible passion with God, continue to look at your depravity. Continue to say, God, this is an amazing moment. I love what's happening here.

But God, I am a sinful person and I am saved by your grace. Peter missed that step. Peter's like, I'll die with you right now. I'll do whatever I can with you. And sometimes we need that. That zeal got me through some really hard times. But it was something that needed to be checked. Second point is this. Jesus understands the reality of our weakness.

Go to verse 38. Jesus answered, will you lay down your life for me? Then he says, two trulies. Truly, truly, I say to you, the rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times. I say God is not surprised by our failure. And I love that when he's speaking to Peter here, he responds not with anger, but just with a sobering truth. The fact that Jesus knows your weaknesses and he still picked you, he still died for you, is a message of grace.

It is a message of grace that he knows who you are. He loves you for who you are. He knows that you will fail him. And he still loves you and he still offers you unmerited favor and unmerited grace. When we are in Christ, God sees you with the same resume of Jesus Christ through his blood. It is his blood of the cross that brings us grace. I'm going to go to Matthew 26, 41.

When he's speaking to his disciples, he says, watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. I don't want to live in a self-depreciating mode all the time, always beating yourself up. So if you're doing that, stop doing that. I'm horrible. I'm no good. If you do that, please add the conjunction, but for the blood of Jesus, I would be lost.

You see, he did not die on the cross so that we can continue to live in shame and guilt. He died for shame. He died for guilt. He died for the wrath of God. If you are in Jesus, he can no longer be angry at you. If God can be, even when you make a mistake, if God can still be angry with you now once you're in Jesus Christ, if he can still be angry with you, then Jesus didn't suffer all of God's wrath on the cross.

That doesn't mean he doesn't understand your mistakes. He doesn't mean that he still won't discipline you. It doesn't mean that he doesn't have a record that, hey, that was wrong. I understand that that was wrong. But there is no more wrath left for the believer. There is no more shame for the believer. If you want to walk in shame, you can. It's your choice.

But according to his ledger in heaven, if you are in Jesus Christ, God cannot be angry with you because Jesus died for all of his wrath. He cannot look at you with shame. He cannot look at you in any, like I said earlier, pejorative way because his blood is sufficient. His grace is enough. That doesn't mean, according to like it says in Paul in 8, chapter 6 through 8, that we should keep on sinning.

But this is the God we serve. Timothy Keller passed away recently, incredible pastor of Redeemer Church in New York. He said this, the gospel is this, we are more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe. Yet at the very same time, we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope. We are more flawed than we ever believed and we are more accepted than we ever dared hoped.

If you spend eternity contemplating how accepted you are by God, you would never get to the end of that question. If you spend eternity contemplating how much God loves you, you would never get to the end of that question. I want to encourage you by his grace and through the cross to spend some time thinking about how awesome he thinks you are.

Understanding how flawed we are. But if you just spent this week saying, God, I know you love me and I am loved by you and you just lean into his love, that is what he wants you to experience. What he doesn't want you to experience is, oh, I'm horrible. I'm miserable. God's mad at me. God can't be mad at you or Jesus' blood wasn't enough. Third point is this.

There's grace beyond the rooster's crow. Go to verse 38b. And this is the point that really hit me this week that I based the whole sermon around. Truly, truly, I say to you, the rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times. I have a question. Why a rooster? Why is that the tell, right? I'm thinking to myself, why not say when Orion is next to the third moon, whatever.

Or why not, hey, when there is a, the watchman on the wall cries out in the third watch, you will deny me before, or before the servant girl, why a rooster? Rooster is only mentioned one other time in the scripture besides the Peter narrative. It's mentioned in four gospels, rooster is mentioned. But it's only mentioned one other time in scripture.

And it's really interesting because this moment of redemption, this just was such a revelation to me. The moment of redemption is tied to the rooster's crow. Let's look at the first thing. First time you're going to see it is in Proverbs 30, 29 through 31. It says there are three things, this is in Proverbs, the only other time in the scripture where you have the word rooster.

Three things are stately in their tread. Four are stately in their stride. The lion, which is the mightiest among the beasts and does not turn back before any. The strutting rooster, the he-goat, and the king who has an army with him. It's interesting that the lion is king of the jungle. He seems to do well on his own. A rooster will run. A king here has to have his army with him, right?

He-goat will also run. A lion will, I watch a lot of YouTube videos about lions. They rarely run. They're the king of the jungle for a reason. The reason I think it mentions a rooster and a rooster is used because a rooster is a symbol of pride. A rooster is the symbol of pride. When they say, oh, you're cocksure of yourself, they're talking about a rooster, a strutting rooster that goes around the farmyard, right?

This symbol of pride. There is no more pride than when you say to Jesus, wherever you go, I will be able to follow you. Whatever you do, I will follow you. Why can I not come now? I'll even bring my little sword and try to cut Malchus' ear off. Like, I'm awesome until I'm not. And servant girls make me flee. So that's the first thing that I saw. The second thing was this.

What is the rooster a symbol of? It is the symbol of a new day. And in the midst of him failing, he says the third time he denies it. It says one of the gospels, while he was still speaking, the rooster crows and a new day begins. Remember, Judas went out a few hours earlier? And what did it say at the end of that passage? And it was night. Peter denies, and it was day.

Jesus was not crucified at night. Jesus was crucified in the daylight. It became dark after he died, and that was a movement of God in the middle of the day. But this was such a word of grace to me. That while you're failing, he's like the rooster's going to crow because your comeback begins today. Your comeback begins now. In this moment, in this place, your redemption begins because I don't want to wait for it.

And from that point on, look, Peter went his own way. And the two things that are different about him and Judas is Judas never came back. Peter did. Granted, he went fishing. But when he saw Jesus on that shore in John 21, he dives into the water. You might have counted yourself out right now because you're in a rough place. Maybe you did something last night.

You're like, I've got to get to church today because that was rough. In the midst of that, God is calling you home. You're never too far away. You've never gone too long. And his grace is sufficient. One of the people who learned this was John Newton. If you don't know John Newton, he wrote the song Amazing Grace. He was a slave trader in the 1700.

And he lived this really rebellious life of sin and cruelty. And there was one night where there was a storm, and he had these slaves, and he was working the slave trade in the 1700s. There was a storm. In the middle of the storm, he cried out to God. He said, God, if you save me, I will turn my life over to you. The slave traders can't come back, especially in our society.

It's worse now. There's a worse thought of slave traders now than there was then because it was legal. They can't really come back, can they? But he did live. He went back and sold his ships, got rid of the slave trade, gave his life to Jesus Christ, and began to be a person who would speak as an abolitionist. He worked with William Wilberforce, and he was one of the key people that helped end slavery in England.

In the midst of a storm, with a cargo of human beings in the belly of his ship, he cried out to God, and his comeback began. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. His grace is sufficient. If you stand, we're going to bring the band back up to lead us. Amazing grace. He was found, but now I am found. Like me, I once was lost, but now I am found.

Was blind, but now I see. I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I have a man, I Remember your children.

Remember your promise, oh God. Your grace, your grace is enough. Your grace is enough. Your grace is enough for me. Come on, put your hands together, y'all. This is good. Your grace is enough. Your grace is enough. Your grace is enough for me. Amen. We have a prayer team come forward. If you need a comeback in your life, you need to rededicate your life.

If you've never made a decision to follow Jesus, come forward. The prayer team will pray with you with an assurance of salvation that you might know Jesus in your heart deeply. We will see you be baptized and you will step out of a world that is still under the wrath of God and not under the blood of Jesus and into a freedom that is redemption through Jesus' name.

With that, I want to ask that you would extend your hands. I want to bless you. If you need prayer after the service or anything else, please come forward. May the God of all grace, who knows your zeal and your weakness, meet you beyond the rooster's crow. May you remember that failure is not final and that Jesus, who knew Peter's denial in advance, was planning his restoration.

May you walk in the mercy that meets you at the morning's light and the love that never lets you go. Go now not in your strength of your resolve, but in the power of his grace. It's not too late. You're never too far. His grace is enough. We pray this in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Love you guys. Get a praying cross. Come forward for prayer.