Until then

This week, we are talking about failure by walking through five scenes in the life of Peter. So far, we have heard Jesus’ prediction of Peter’s denial and Peter’s actual denial (all three of them). Today, Peter experiences hope for the first time since his denial.


John 20
1 Early on Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance.
2 She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved. She said, “They have taken the Lord’s body out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”
3 Peter and the other disciple started out for the tomb.
4 They were both running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.
5 He stooped and looked in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he didn’t go in.
6 Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linen wrappings lying there,
7 while the cloth that had covered Jesus’ head was folded up and lying apart from the other wrappings.
8 Then the disciple who had reached the tomb first also went in, and he saw and believed
9 for until then they still hadn’t understood the Scriptures that said Jesus must rise from the dead.


Until then. My failures, along with the guilt and shame of those failures, have always been accompanied with a sense of darkness in my life. That is why I love the phrase “while it was still dark” in this passage. While it was still dark in my life, a darkness that I had created, God was at work creating light for my life. If you are still sitting in the darkness of your failures, I encourage you to walk through that passage with Peter ... running to the tomb ... going inside ... seeing the linen wrappings ... encountering hope. It says that “until then” they didn’t understand. If you are still sitting in the darkness, my prayer is that you will experience an “until then” moment where you begin to understand the hope that can be found in Jesus’ resurrection. If you have experienced that hope, my prayer is that you will be reminded of the “until then” moment when you first saw the light in the darkness.