Spiritual Cripple or Spiritual Giant?

On the occasion of Jesus taking the Last Supper with the twelve disciples, Jesus informs Peter that Satan has asked for permission to “test” Peter. Jesus granted that permission and told Peter that he would not pass the “test”. That, in fact, despite Peters assertion that he was willing to die for Jesus or be imprisoned with him, Peter would do neither of those things but would, In fact, deny that he even knew Jesus. Jesus, additionally, informed Peter that even though he was going to fail… his faith did not need to fail and he had prayed to God that it would not. Furthermore he charged Peter with strengthening the other disciples after his failure. A few points… Satan saw a weakness in Peter and wanted the opportunity to exploit it. Jesus granted that because he knew Peter would be made stronger for it. Sometimes failure can lead to a loss of faith. Satan wins twice; he wins by creating an episode for failure and he wins when we become so despondent by our failure that our faith becomes crippled. And then we need a spiritual ”handicapped parking sticker”. There are three medicines for faith problems that Jesus employed 1) He predicted Peter’s failure. That’s huge. If someone wiser can identify the results of unrighteous behavior for an individual, the individual can look back on those words and think “if only I had listened”. 2) Jesus prayed that Peter’s faith would not fail. Christians should be active in their prayer on behalf of others. It worked for Peter and it can work for your loved ones. 3) Jesus gave Peter a job to do… strengthen the other disciples. Wait a minute, wasn’t Peter the one who needed to be strengthened? Yes he was but we are made stronger when we are helping others. Know someone whose faith has been crippled? Get them back to work for God. Work makes us strong. Sitting on our rear ends makes us weak. Satan’s tests can make us stronger even if we fail them. They did for Peter and Jesus allowed those tests because he needed for Peter to be stronger. He needs for us to be stronger too.