Rick Warren - God's Mercy and My Failures—Part Four

Hello, and thanks for joining us today on Pastor Rick's

Daily Hope. This is the Bible teaching ministry of Rick Warren,

and today we are continuing in a series called the

Miracle of Mercy. Rick will show us how God's mercy

can lift your guilt, heal your wounds, and transform.

The way you live.

And now the final part of a message called God's

Mercy and My Failures number four.

When we failed, he shows us mercy when we're down.

He shows us his mercy when we're down. He doesn't

beat us up, he doesn't pile on, he doesn't add

to our guilt. He doesn't add scorn and shame and

a scolding. He saves us. And when you have failed,

he doesn't just come in and go let me tell

you how bad you've done. No, he shows mercy when

we're down. And there's a beautiful example of this. It's tender.

It's a very tender example in John chapter twenty one.

Here's the story. This is a couple weeks after the resurrection.

So it's about like now, we're two weeks after Easter,

So right about now, two weeks after Easter. You know,

I told you Jesus was around for forty more days,

it says. Two weeks later, Jesus appeared again to the

disciples beside the Sea of Galilee. Seven of the disciples

were there, and Simon Peter said they hadn't seen Jesus yet.

Simon Peter said, I'm going fishing. Friends, that's a statement

of depression. I'm going fishing. Okay, Peter's gone. I haven't

recovered from this trauma. It's only two weeks out since

my biggest failure in life. All I'm going to do.

All I need to do is go back and do

what I used to do before I've started following Jesus

three and a half years ago. I was a professional fisherman.

I'm going to go back all things I know how

to do, Just go fishing. I'm down, I'm discouraged, I'm

not feeling good. I'm going fishing. Anybody want to go

with me? And the other guys go, sure, we'll go

with you. So Peter said, I'm going fishing. We'll come

to They all said. So. They went out of the boat,

but even though they fished all night, they caught nothing.

He ever felt like that. I've been looking for a

job for how many months? I've fished all night. I've

caught nothing. I've been looking to get married for so long.

I've fished all night, I've caught nothing. I've been waiting

for this ship to come in. I fished all night.

I've gotten This is called a failure. These are professional fishermen.

If anybody should catch fish, it's professional fishermen. We fished

all night, We've caught nothing. This is a failure. They

got another failure in their life. Now, at dawn, the

disciples saw a man standing on the shore, but they

couldn't see that it was Jesus, and he called out.

Jesus called out, friends, have you caught any fish? Not

a thing? They replied, At least they're honest about their failure.

Then Jesus said, throw out your net on the right

side of the boat and you'll get plenty of fish.

So they did what Jesus said to do, and they

instantly caught so many fish they couldn't even draw in

the net because it was so full of fish. Now,

you may have fished all night and caught nothing, but

God can do more in five minutes in your life

than you can do in fifty years of planning. They

had fished all night and caught nothing. You've been planning

this dream of years for so long, and it just

has gone nowhere. Well, it says, when they did what

Jesus said to do, they caught more than they could

possibly handle. God can do more in your life in

a few seconds. If you'll just obey him, then you

can do on your own schemes and plants. Caught all

these fish, and it was just so full a fish.

Then John, one of the disciples, said to Peter, it's

the Lord. Well done. Okay, okay. All of a sudden,

we followed this guy's advice from shore. We don't really know.

Maybe he saw something we saw. So we throw it

over and we catch all these fish, and John goes,

it's the Lord. Now. I love what happens next when

Peter realized that he put on his tunic for he

had stripped for work. Now get this, Peter is fishing

butt naked. They've been fishing all night. He's out with

the guys. He's not showing off or anything. He's not working

on a tan obviously because they're fishing at night. He

just doesn't want to get his clothes dirty, have to

take it into the laundromat so while they're out fishing,

he doesn't want to smell. He takes his robe off.

He's laid it over on the side of the boat.

They're all standing there. He's fishing naked. John goes, it's

the lord's as When Peter realized that he put on

his tunic fridge strip for work, jumped in the water

and swam ashore, leaving the others in the boat to

pull the loaded net to shore, for they were only

out about three hundred feet now. When they got to shore,

they saw that Jesus was cooking fish and bread over

a charcoal fire. He's got a barbecue going on here. Okay,

now Jesus can cook. I'd like to see that show

on the Food channel. Yea chopped Jesus won again. We

liked this meal better, okay. So Jesus, he's got a

little barbecue going on here at the side of the

Lake of Galilee. He's cooking fish and bread over a

charcoal fire. Now, Jesus says, bring some of the fish

that you just caught, graciously, not mentioning the fact that

they would have never caught him without him, that they

had caught nothing on their own. So Peter goes back

aboard and dragged the net ashore, and it was filled

with one hundred and fifty three large fish. And yet

the net had not torn. Now that's another miracle, because

if you know anything about the Bible, you know that

they were constantly mending their nets because they were always breaking. Fact,

when Jesus met them three and a half years earlier,

they were out mending their nets. Now, Jesus says, now,

come and have some breakfast. Jesus said, you deserve a

break break today. I've got these little fish mcmuffins for

you for breakfast. Fresh bread, fresh fish, freshman muffins, a

little special sauce on the side. Here. Okay, come on,

we're gonna have breakfast, Jesus said. Now they were sure

it really was the Lord. Then Jesus served them circle

that phrase. Then Jesus served them he's being kind, he's

being loving, he's been merciful. He's cooked them breakfast. Then

Jesus served them the bread and the fish. Now, this

was the third time that Jesus had appeared to his

disciples since he had been raised from the dead, and

there were many other times after this. And now that's

a beautiful tender story of the mercy of God. Let

me ask you, let me put it in context. Let's

talk about you. Let's say you just went through your

worst day of your life as Jesus is arrested, tortured,

and murdered. You've gone through the worst day of your life,

and your best friend deserts you, doesn't show up, and

more than that, denies you and pretends like they don't

even know you. Two weeks later, would you cook them

a nice breakfast? No, you wouldn't. That's mercy. That's mercy.

He's showing how much he loves him even after their

betrayal and denial. He cooks some breakfast you wouldn't cook

somebody who just betrayed you, and you probably spit in

the food if you did love good back at them.

That's mercy. You see, God's mercy towards you is not

dependent upon your performance. The Bible says it like this

Lamentations three, twenty two and twenty three. The steadfast love

of the Lord never ceases. In other words, it never stops.

It never ends. The steadfast love. It's unchanging, it's never exhausted.

God never gets tired of loving you. The steadfast love

of the Lord never ceases. His mercy. Mercy's never come

to an end. God's never gonna say, Okay, I've had

enough of your farres. That's enough forgiveness nine thousand times,

not nine thousand and one. Okay, that's just one too many.

I've had enough. His mercies never come to an end.

It says his mercies are new every morning. You got

the same old sins, but He's got new mercy for

you every single morning. And that says, great is your faithfulness.

God is faithful to you in his mercy. No matter

what you do. Do you realize how faithful God's mercy

is to you, Let me show you one of the

most amazing verses in the entire Bible. Look up here

on the screen Tewody two thirteen. If we are unfaithful,

he God remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself. God

cannot deny himself. God cannot be unfaithful. And even when

you're unfaithful, He will be faithful. You may give up

on God, He's never going to give up on you.

That's the mercy of God. You may be unfaithful to God,

He's never going to be unfaithful to you. Now. The

last point is the greatest miracle of mercy of it all,

and it is this. He not only believes in us,

praise for us, shows us mercy when we're down, doesn't

get upset about it, not shocked. Number five, He uses

our failures to build his church. God actually uses our

failures to build his church. Jesus had told Peter, Peter,

when you have turned back to me, strengthen and build

up your brothers. He's talking about the brothers and sisters

in Christ, the family of God, the Church. Use your

failure to strengthen and build up others. Here's the rest

of that story. There on the beach at Galilee, Verse

fifteen John twenty one, after breakfast, Jesus asked. Jesus said

to Simon, Peter, Simon, son of John, do you love

me more than these? Now? This is echoing back a

statement where at the Last Supper Peter said, I love

you more than all of these, and I would never

never deny you. Everybody else right, but I would never

do that. He said, Simon, do you love me more

than these? Yes? Lord, you know I love you. Peter replied,

Then feed my lambs, Jesus said, my flock, that's the church,

the flock of God, the Church. Then feed my lambs,

Jesus said. Then Jesus repeated the question, Peter, do you

love me? Do you love me? Peter said, yes, Lord, yes, Lord,

you know you know I love you. Then take care

of my sheep. Jesus said, I want you to care

about my family, the flock, the body of Christ, the Church.

Take care of my sheep. Then Jesus asked the same

question one more time, Peter, do you love me? And

Peter was grieved that Jesus asked the question a third time.

So he said, and I could hear the exasperation in

his voice. Lord, Lord, you know I love you. You know everything,

and you know that I love you. And Jesus replied,

then feed my sheep. The way you show your love

for God is by helping other people in the family

of God. Why did Jesus ask this question three times?

Do you love me? He was giving Peter the opportunity

to make up for three denials. I will never deny you.

I will never deny you. I will never deny you.

And he did one, two, three times, and so he said,

do you love me? Do you love me? Do you

love me. Yes Lord, Yes, Lord, Yes Lord. Then feed

my sheep, and let's go back to the beginning. Both

Judas and Peter friends of Jesus. Both of them committed

the same sin. They both denied Christ, exact same sin,

just different experiences. They turned their back on him in

a time of need. Judas became a trader. Peter became

a teacher. Feed my sheep. Judas became a trader. Peter

became a teacher. What are you going to become from

your failure? What are you going to allow the failures

in your life to make you traitor or a teacher?

It's your choice. The fact is God is building his

church on people who failed. God has only used failed

people because there aren't any non failures in life. And

in Matthew sixteen eighteen, Jesus said this, Now, I say

to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock

I will build my church and the powers of Hell

will not conquer it. Now, some of you know this

is actually a play on word in the original Greek manuscripts,

because the word Peter is the word petros and the

word rock is the word petra. They're very different. He

said you are Peter, Petros. But you're going to be Petra,

the rock on which I'm in my mercy gonna build

on the faith, your faith and on your failures. Petros

Peter literally means a stone. It means a small rock.

It means a pebble. So so Peter really was a pebble.

He was a stone. That's his name. Stone rocks in

a pebble. Petra means a giant rock, a boulder. It

can mean a cliff of rock, it can be a

mountain of granite. It's a rock at Gibraltar. Rock that's

a Petra. And Jesus is saying to this guy who's

just had this enormous failure just a few days earlier. Yeah,

you've been unstable, you've been foot in mouth, you've been impulsive,

you've denied me, you've been a little stone. But you're

gonna be a rock at Gibraltar because of my mercy

and pasted and we're going to go on and I'm

going to build my church on your failures. God wants

to build his church on your your failures. He wants

to use you the same way he used Peter. So

let me end with two questions. Number one, what failure

have you had that God wants to use in this church.

What failure have you had that God wants to use

to build his church. If you've had a failed business,

you should be helping businessmen because you know what it's

like to have a failed business. If you've had a bankruptcy,

you should be helping people who are going through bankruptcy.

If you've had a failed marriage, you should be helping

people save their marriages. If you've had an abortion, you

should be helping women who are struggling with that decision

right now. If you've had a failure in any other

area of your life, if you've had an addiction, you

should be helping people who haven't have that addiction. God

wants to use your failures to build his church. Don't

waste your failures. Last week we talked about not wasting

your pain, and I said, you're gonna have pain, don't

waste it. If you've been abused, use it to help

people who've been abused. If you've been raped or molested,

use it to help people who've been raped or molested.

If you've been abandoned or betrayed, help people who have

been abandoned or betrayed, and on and on. God wants

to take your greatest failure and turn it into your

greatest success. God wants to take your greatest hurt and

turn it into your greatest ministry. Chuck Colson went to

prison and then founded Prison Fellowship, an enormous ministry that

helps prisoners all around the world. What failure, dous God

want to use in your life? The second question, are

you going to respond to your failure like Judas or

like Peter? Now that's your choice. Judas had a break down,

Peter had to break through. Judas gave up. Peter looked up.

Judas rejected the mercy of God. Peter accepted the mercy

of God. Judas lived in condemnation. Peter lived in celebration

of the mercy of God. Judas ended up taking his

life in despair. Peter ended up living his life on purpose.

It's all your choice, And just fifty days after Peter's

biggest failure, God chose him. Peter, that guy, the screw up,

the mess up, the guy who denied Jesus in his

deepest hour of pain. He chose Peter to be the

guy to preach on the day of Pentecost. On the

first day of the Christian Church and three thousand people

were saved in baptized. That is the mercy of God.

And it wasn't like a year after the failure. It's

fifty days after he screwed up. He's standing in front

of everybody preaching on Pentecost at the birth of the

Christian Church. That is the mercy of God. That's power heads.

Would you pray this prayer God. I've had a lot

of failures in my life, and like Peter, I've overestimated

my strength. And I said I'd never do that, but

I did, and I feared the disapproved of other people.

And I've been quiet, and I've been a coward, and

I've denied you when I could have spoken up for

you at work, when I could have told other people

about your love, and I was more worried about their disapproval.

And I've fallen into that trap. And Lord, of course,

many many times I've spoken without thinking, and my tongue

has gotten me in a lot of trouble. I want

to do the right things that Peter did. I don't

want to brush it aside and rationalize my failures. I

want to grieve them. And I'm coming to you saying Lord,

my heart's broken and I'm sorry, and I have a

contrite spirit, and I'm a little more humble than I

used to be. And I'm coming to you with a

repentant heart saying I'm sorry and forgear me for the

times that I've isolated myself and tried to handle everything

on my own and not want people to know about

my pain. Help me to let my small group support me,

Help me to build that social that support network. Now,

to get in a small group now before the next

crisis comes. And then, most of all, Lord, I cast

myself on your mercy, and like that giant boulder, I

just let it go. I just drop it. And today

I'm dropping my anxiety. I'm dropping my insecurity. I'm dropping

my fears, the regrets, the shames, all of the things

that Satan pulls that trigger on and whips me around with.

I cast myself on your mercy. I don't deserve your

forgiveness or your grace, but you are a forgiving God

and you love to show mercy. Thank you that you're

not shocked by my failures. Thank you that you're praying

for me right now. Thank you Jesus that you believe

in me, that you know my name, that you give

me encouragement, not discouragement. Thank you that you show me

mercy and you fix me breakfast when I'm down. Thank

you that your mercy's never come to an end, that

they're new every morning, not even tomorrow morning. You'll have

new mercy for me. You are a faithful God. Great

is your faithfulness. And God wants you to use my

failures to build your church. I don't want to be

a trader. I want to be a teacher. And I

want you to turn this little stone into a rock

of Gibraltar. And I humbly ask this in Jesus' name.

Amen, Hey, did you know that the number one attribute

of God in scripture is his mercy? It is and

he wants to be merciful too. Jesus said, blessed are

the merciful, for they will be shown mercy Matthew five, p.

Seven.

Now you can dive deeper into our current study with

Pastor Rick's Miracle of Mercy study kit. Through his six

session video and workbook study, he'll show you the five

marks of mercy. You'll discover how mercy forgives the fallen,

helps the hurting, is patient with difficult people, is kind

to its enemies and cares for the loss. And as

you grow in mercy, you'll experience the blessing God promises

to the merciful. The Miracle of Mercy six session video

study kit is perfect for both personal and small group

study time, so please be sure to request your copy today.

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