I’ve grown as a Christian over the last 13 years and it is still amazing to me how often I acknowledge Christ with my lips and deny him by my actions. Sometimes I, like Peter, fall short of even this. This morning I read Luke 22, and to recount, Jesus is explaining to his disciples at the Last Supper that he will be betrayed by one of his friends and eventually be murdered. In response to this, Peter says to Jesus, “Lord I am ready to go with you to prison and to death!” I love the passion, the conviction, the commitment!

Peter resonates with me because when I think about those moments when God is stirring my heart, I often feel this sense of urgency to do something, anything. But as the quietness of the morning gives way to the tyranny of the urgent (or worse to fear), my resolve dwindles and I sit back waiting on the world change. Jesus knowing Peter’s heart (and mine) responds, “I tell you, Peter, that the rooster will not crow this day until you deny three times that you know me.”

You know what happens next:

Another insisted, saying, “Certainly this man also was with him, for he too is a Galilean.” But Peter said, “Man I do not know what you are talking about.” And immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed. And the Lord turned and looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the saying of the Lord, how he had said to him, “Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times.” And (Peter) went out and wept bitterly.

It is amazing to me that after all this, Jesus names Peter as the rock upon which He will build his house! It is even amazinger that Peter accepts, even embraces this responsibility…but then again what else can he do? He is called by the Lord.

When God call us to a purpose or responsibility, we are faced with a choice. Will we deny Him or will we respond? Not wussified empty words of our own strength. Not faith that is dead. But faith that leads to action (read James 1-2). In Red Letters, Tom Davis confesses that “Living the gospel is hard work. It’s easy to talk about it. Any of us can sit in church and sing warm, happy worship songs that make us feel good. We can nod agreeably with the pastor’s wisdom. And sometimes we can even drop a few extra dollars into the offering basket. But it’s not easy to actually go and do what Jesus said to do.”

My questions for you today are hard ones. Will you do what Jesus said to do? Will you champion the cause of the orphan, the widow, the ill, and the impoverished? Or will you ‘weep bitterly’ like Peter because your words are empty and your faith is dead?

Today pray and be available for God to move you to action. Then do it again tomorrow. And the next day. And the next. Pick up a book. Start a RLC group. Tell a friend. Adopt a child. But do something. In his book The End of Poverty, renowned economist Jeffrey Sachs explains that everyday 6000 lives are claimed by preventable, curable, treatable diseases. Bono and the One Campaign agree. The question is not do we have the capability to end extreme poverty in our lifetime. It’s do we have the will?

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