Before the Rooster Crows

A courtyard in the middle of the night. A fire crackling. Faces lit orange in the dark. And one man pulling his cloak a little higher, hoping nobody looks at him too closely.

Only a few hours earlier, at the Passover meal, Peter had made Jesus a promise. “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death.” Jesus answered him gently. “I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me.” But Jesus also said this: “I have prayed for you, that your faith will not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.” Now Jesus has been arrested in the garden. The soldiers lead him away to the house of the high priest. And Peter follows. Not close. At a distance.

In the middle of the courtyard, some people have lit a fire against the cold, and they sit around it, talking in low voices. Peter slips in and sits down among them. He is close enough to see what happens to Jesus, and he hopes he is ordinary enough not to be noticed. But a servant girl sees him sitting in the firelight. She looks hard at him. Then she says, to everyone, “This man was with him too.” And Peter says, “Woman, I don’t know him.”

A little later, someone else looks over. “You are one of them.” And Peter says, “Man, I am not.” The fire pops. The night goes on. About an hour passes. Peter is still there. He has come further than most of the others dared. But he cannot bring himself to tell the truth. Then another man speaks up, and this time he is sure. “Certainly this fellow was with him. He’s a Galilean.” And Peter says, “Man, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

And while the words are still in his mouth, a rooster crows. Just at that moment, Luke tells us, the Lord turned and looked at Peter. Across the courtyard. Through the firelight. Their eyes meet. Luke doesn’t tell us what was in that look. But Peter remembers. He remembers every word. Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times. And Peter goes out of the courtyard, into the dark street, and weeps bitterly.

That could have been the end of Peter’s story. The man who promised everything, and then said, I don’t know him. But remember what Jesus had said. I have prayed for you. When you have turned back. Not if. When. A few days later, after the tomb was found empty, the friends of Jesus said to one another, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon.” Simon is Peter. The one who failed was not forgotten. He was found.

Why did the third man say, he’s a Galilean? Peter was a fisherman from Galilee, in the north of the country, and people there spoke with a regional accent that folk in Jerusalem could pick out. Matthew’s Gospel tells the same moment this way: “your speech gives you away.” So Peter could keep his face in the shadows, but every time he opened his mouth, where he came from was obvious.

Before the Rooster Crows. You’ll find it in Luke chapter 22, verses 54 to 62. Peter failed the very friend he loved most. But Jesus had already prayed for him, and the look across the courtyard was not the last word. So here’s the question to carry with you. When you have let Jesus down, will you run from him, or turn back to him?