Whose Concerns Matter Most? Matthew 16:23.

When Jesus spoke of His imminent death, Peter interrupted: “Oh no, Master! This will never happen to you!”

Jesus looked at him, shaking his head, maybe, and said:

“Get thee behind me, Satan, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God but of man” Matthew 16:23.

How’s that for a stinging rebuke? Can you imagine that? It’s worse than a belt, a spanking stick, having to pull your color, an infraction, a trip to the office, getting suspended, arrested even…. He is the Creator of the universe, the Redeemer of all mankind, the Rescuer, the Ransom, the Guardian of our souls—and He looks at you and calls you ‘Satan’? Wow.

I mean, Jesus just called Peter ‘Satan.’ And that’s right after He said “Blessed are you, God revealed to you the truth that I am the anointed one, and because of your faith, I will now call you ‘ROCK’” Matthew 16:18. –And five verses later Jesus calls him Satan?

Talk about humble pie. Jesus builds you up, then He has to knock you down a peg….

But why? Why was He so hard on Peter? Did Peter do wrong? What Peter did was TEMPT Jesus. Jesus was struggling with His future. He knew how hard and scary it would be. Later He would say “My soul is deeply grieved, even to the point of death” Matthew 26:38. And Satan was there ready to offer Jesus any number of shortcuts that would ruin God’s plan. Jesus wrestled in the garden, sweating blood. That’s a heavy burden. THAT is anxiety! And Peter, so ignorant and unaware of what is really going on, speaks up voicing exactly the ideas that tempt Jesus so much.

So Jesus rebukes him strongly: “Get thee behind me, Satan…” That’s stunning.

How good are you at rejecting temptations? Do you fight back as strongly as Jesus did? Do you give a strong rebuke? Do you hate evil, or are you wishy- washy about it? Can you REJECT temptations when they come, shutting them down, once and for all? Or do you toy with them, window shopping and considering your options? You need to slam the temptations. Reject them, put them away, and fix it so they cannot bother you any more. It’s like handling a noisy phone. Turn the phone off and put it in a drawer. Don’t pull it back out for hours.

(Can you do that with your phone? –Can you do it with temptations?)

Ask Jesus to help you reject temptations with a powerful, no-going-back answer. Ask Him to help you put your foot down and reject temptations the way Jesus rejected Peter at that moment. When you say no, be sure that you mean it—and never go back on it, never question it. Say ‘no’ and move on. Turn off the temptations and bury them in the drawer.

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