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

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. Let's lean in for part one of

a message called God's Mercy and My Failures.

Because we are an imperfect people and we live in

an imperfect world, we all experience failures in life. And

the night that Jesus Christ was arrested before he went

to the cross, two of his best friends had massive failures.

Massive failures.

Judas had the failure of betrayal and Peter had the

failure of denial. Now they're actually the exact same sin.

They both denied Christ, but they are just different expressions

of it. And Judas rejected the mercy of God and

later went out and killed himself took his life. Peter

accepted the mercy of God and later went out and

became the leader of the church. What I want us

to do this weekend is look at God's mercy and

your failures, and I want us to learn some lessons

from the life of Peter in this massive failure that

he had.

And I want us to ask three questions.

First, what causes personal failure in your life? And we're

going to look and actually see that three things that

Peter had in his life are the three most common

causes of failure in your life. Financial failure, business failure,

marriage failure, relational failure, and all the other areas of

failure are caused primarily by three things. There are many

other uns, but these are the three biggest ones. And

then we're going to look at not only what Peter

did wrong, but what he did right, and how do

you recover? What does God want you to do when

you've had a failure in your life? And then, most

important of all, we're going to look at how does

Jesus respond to our failures and how he shows us mercy.

So let's get right into it.

First, what causes our personal failure? Three things that Peter

did wrong? And the first thing, if you're taking notes

of this, we overestimate our strengths. This is a big

cause of failure in your life. When you think that

you're stronger than you really are, You think you can

handle more, and you can think you can handle temptation.

The story begins in Matthew chapter twenty six. Now they'd

just had the Last Supper, where Jesus said, I'm going

to be arrested, I'm going to die, but three days later,

I'm going to come back to life, and I'll meet

you in Galilee after that, And in verse thirty one

of Matthew twenty six, Jesus says.

This to disciples.

Jesus said, tonight, every one of you will desert me.

Talking to the twelve. It's his small group that's been

with him for three and a half years. Every one

of you will desert me. For the scripture says that

when the shepherd is killed, the sheep will be scattered.

But after I've been raised from the dead, this is

in three days, I will go ahead of you to

Galilee and I'll meet you there. Then Peter boasted, But Lord,

even if everyone else fails you, I will never deny you,

Jesus replied Peter. The truth is that before this night

is over, and before the rooster crows at dawn, you

will deny knowing me. Three times, Peter insisted, But Lord,

I would never do that, even if I have to

die with you. I will never deny knowing you. And

all the other disciples vowed the same thing. They all

made the same You may have never seen that, but

they all said we would never do this. Lord Jesus said,

you're going to do it tonight. He said, when they

take me, arrest me, you're gonna fall to pieces.

You can count on it. Now.

Notice three times Peter says, I'll never deny you. I

would never do that, and I would never deny knowing.

You at all.

Ever, this is overestimating our strengths. A lot of businesses

fail from overestimating their strengths. A lot of battles are

lost because armies overestimated their strength. A lot of people

students flunk out of school because they overestimated their strengths.

A lot of spouses fall into affairs because they overestimated

their strength. I can handle this. It's just a harmless

little office flirt. There's nothing going to happen from it.

I can handle this. Beware of thinking this could never

happen to me.

Now.

First Corinthians ten, verse twelve says this, if you think

I'm strong, I can handle this, I'd never fall for

that temptation. Then be careful, for you could easily fall.

To the Bible says, one of the reasons we have

so many fails in our lives. In our lives is

because we think we're stronger than we really are. Don't

be naive, don't be self confident. Don't none of us

are exempt. Given the right situation, I am capable of

any sin.

So are you.

Given the right situation, you are capable of any sin,

and so am I. And the Bible says, the heart

is deceitful and we should stop kidding ourselves now. I

don't have time to go into this in detail. But

not only do we have failings in our life because

we overestimate our strengths, but also we misuse our strengths.

You see, you tend to guard your weaknesses. You know

what you're weak at. You know what's you're weak at. See,

I gotta stay away from that because I'm.

Weak at that.

But you don't pay any attention to your And when

you don't pay attention to your strengths, they become weaknesses too.

In fact, write this down. An unguarded strength is a

double weakness. An unguarded strength is a double weakness. The

very area you think, man, there's no way I'd mess

up on that. You're setting yourself up. The Bible says

for failure, there's a sense of pride there the very

area you may have just had a major victory, maybe

exactly where you stumble next. You know, Sometimes it's after

a big success that then you have the failure. Sometimes

it's after you've been to a very strong spiritual crisis

and you came out of it and you actually made it,

that you let your guard down. Jesus was tempted in

the desert immediately after his baptism, which was a big experience.

Peter had his biggest failure denying Christ right after the

Last Supper, which was a very intimate, important, powerful experience. Ever,

presume that you know where temptation is going to come from.

We overestimate our strengths. Second reason we fail, this one's

even bigger. We fear the disapproval of others. You may

not realize it, but this causes more problems in your

life than almost anything else. We fear the disapproval of

other people. Every time you make a decision based on

what other people would think, you are sowing the seeds

for failure in your life.

Because when you.

Worry about what will other people think, when you fear disapproval,

when you fear disapproval, you go with the flow, even

when you know it's the wrong thing. You go with

the flow because you know, go along to get along.

And you're become a people pleaser, and you become a coward,

and you make commitments that you can't possibly keep simply

because you're trying.

To make everybody happy.

Now we see this as the second reason Peter stumbled

in his in his denials in Matthew, chapter twenty six,

verse fifty eight. In sixty nine and seventy, the Bible

says this, after they had left the last supper in

the upper room, Peter followed Jesus at a distance.

Now there's a problem right there.

That's a major problem following Jesus at a distance. But

he followed Jesus at a distance to the courtyard of

the High priest Palace, and he went in and he

sat down with the guards, the Roman guards, to see

what was going to happen to Jesus. He's being being arrested,

He's going to be tortured. Peter wants to know what's

going on. As Peter was sitting in the courtyard. A

servant girl came up to him and said, you, you know,

I recognize you. You You were with Jesus of Galilee,

weren't you, but standing there in front of everyone? Now

that's the operational phrase, standing there in front of everyone.

Peter denied it. I don't even know what you're talking about.

He said, now, think about this Jesus. Peter is just

spent three and a half years with Jesus Christ, the

Son of God. He's lived with him for three and

a half years, and the first time the rubber hits

the road, he's in the clinch. He's in the crisis.

He denies us, I don't even know what you're talking about.

He's more worried about what other people think than he

is about identifying with Christ. How many times have you

had the opportunity to admit you were a Christian at

work or somewhere else, and you said nothing because you

were worried about what other people think. And this thing

actually happens in our life all the time, not just

with witnessing about our faith, but in so many areas

you stumble and you have failures because you are thinking

more about what somebody else thinks than about what God thinks.

He said, I don't even know the person now. Peter

struggled with people pleasing his entire life. I could give

you many examples in his life. One time Paul had

to actually rebuke him and say, hey, Peter, you know

you're acting this way with this group over here, and

you act this way with this group over here. You're

trying to please everybody. You can't do that. Before we

go on, let me just ask you some consider some questions.

Personally.

Are you following Jesus at a distance? You say, you know,

I want to be a follower Jesus. I just don't

want to get too close to him. I don't want

to be a radical. I don't want to be a fanatic.

I want to follow Jesus at a distance. That is

a setup for failure. It's trying to have a foot

in both worlds. It doesn't work that way. The Bible

tells us that Peter was just sitting around waiting for

something to happen. Do you find yourself doing that, sitting

around waiting for something to happen. That's a setup for

failure in your life. And then Peter was worried about

what other people thought. Let me ask you this, whose

opinion matters to you more than God's? Whose opinion matters

to you more than God's? And you're more worried about

what they think than doing the right thing or saying

the right thing. When you let anybody else be more

important than God in your life, they become your God.

And that's called an idol, and that's a setup for failure.

More important even than that of whose opinion matters to

you more than God?

Is this question?

Have you ever asked yourself why the opinions of other

people matter so much to you? Have you ever even

asked yourself that Why you cringe at any criticism, why

you hate it so much? Why it just turns your

stomach in a nod if somebody disagrees with you. Have

you ever asked yourself? Why am I such a coward

when it comes to being different?

Why do other people's opinion.

Matter to me so very very much that I'll even

do the wrong thing in order to please somebody maybe

I don't even like. Have you even asked yourself why

that happens? Why it matters to you so much? Socrates said,

the unexamined life is not worth living. I say the

unexamined life is a setup for failure because the part

of me that causes me the most trouble is the

part of me that I don't know about. And when

I live in denial of an area of my life,

I don't know why I do what I do. If

I'm in the dark about why I do what I do,

I'm never going to grow out of it. I'm going

to be stuck in that rut the rest of my life.

And the same thing is true with you. The part

of you that causes you the most problem are the

parts of you.

You're afraid to look at.

The parts of you that you are in denial about,

the parts of you of why you act away and

you maybe even never even asked, why am I so

controlled by the opinions of other people? Why is it

that I can't handle the disapproval of anybody else? It

just makes me sick, It uspects me. I'll do almost

anything to avoid somebody disapproving of me.

Why does that matter so much? Until you figure.

That out, you're going to keep stumbling and stumbling and

falling and failing in that area. Now, the answer is

the reason why you're worried about the fear of disapproval.

Is there's always a wound behind that, a hidden wound

is always behind the fear of the disapproval of other people.

There's something that triggers in your mind, that fear. And

maybe it was a rejection in the past. Maybe it

was an unmet need that you had growing up. Maybe

it was some hurt, Maybe it was a trauma that

happened in your life, a pain or an injury, as

I said, some kind of unmet need. But there's some pain,

and it's a deep pain, and it's so deep it's

hidden in you. I call it soul pain. The worst

kind of pain is soul pain. That's the kind of

pain you don't even know why you're in pain. You

don't even know why you do what you do. That

soul pain is always related to your identity. If you

don't know who you are as a woman, if you

don't know who you are as a man, you will

be manipulated by the disapproval of other people the rest

of your life. And you'll find yourself backing down when

people say, are you a Christian? Well, yeah, and you

won't stand up for what you believe, and you won't

do the thing that's right because you.

Don't know who you are.

The Bible says in Proverbs twenty nine to twenty five,

it is a dangerous trap to be concerned with what

others think of you. But if you trust the Lord,

you will be safe. He said, I'm already a goner.

I've already fallen into the trap if I'm more worried

about what other people think than doing the right thing

or what God says is the right thing to do

or say, or think or feel. Peter overestimated his strength.

I would never do this. It'll never happen to me.

I can handle this temptation.

I know what I'm.

Doing, adult can I can watch these kind of things.

That it doesn't bother me. Who you kidding?

I can go to these kind of places and it

doesn't bother me.

Who are you kidding?

I can listen to this kind of stuff and it

doesn't bother me.

Who are you gidding?

We all worry about air pollution, but we ought to

worry about mind pollution. The stuff you allow in your brain,

garbage in, garbage out. When we think you're strong and

you're not. When you're worried about the approval of other people.

You're gonna you're gonna have failures in your life. And

then there's a third one that we see in Peter's life,

and this one's the biggest of all we fail. One

of the causes of personal failure is we speak without thinking. Hello,

this may be the most common cause of all failure

in your life. We put our mouth in motion before

we put our mind in gear, and we speak impulsively,

and we speak rashly, and we speak in haste, and

we speak thoughtlessly, and we don't pause to consider the

damage of what we're about to say, what it's going

to do in the lives of other people, or even

in our own lives. And we just speak impulsively. And

the true reason is we don't think rationally. We think emotionally.

Most of the time when you talk, you're not thinking

about what you're talking about. You're not thinking rationally. You're

not thinking what's the unintended consequence of what I'm about

to say. You never stopped to say, Lord, do you

want me to say this? You're not asking God, is

this the right thing to say at the right time,

in the right way. Now, you just say whatever you feel.

People say well, I just say whatever I feel. Is

if that's a mark of courage, No, that's a mark

of immaturity. Children do that, they say whatever they feel.

Adults need to learn to have a governor on their mouth.

And so when you feel envy, you speak an envy,

And when you feel jealousy, you speak in jealousy. And

when you feel insecure, you say things that reveal your insecurity.

And when you're frustrated, and when you're angry, you say

things in anger. And when you're afraid, you say things

in fear, not even thinking about the consequences. The reason

why we have so many failures in our life is

because we speak without thinking.

Wow, some powerful words from Pastor Rick. And now this

really is one of my favorite parts of the broadcast.

Letters from our listeners.

Here's Rick, Hi, everybody, today, I want to share with

you a special testimony from Delia. Delia says that Daily

Hope has helped her with deep anxiety. But then she

also shared about what happened as she began to share

Daily Hope with her parents. She writes this, Pastor Rick,

a couple years ago, I found myself pretty lost. My

company had a merger and all the senior management were

changed overnight, and I was among them. At the same time,

my long term relationship ended. Then a couple months later,

my father was diagnosed with colon cancer. I was in

shock and I fell into a deep depression from all

these changes. In fact, every day I experienced a panic attack.

But then I found your teaching on Daily Hope, and

it just seemed that you understood every emotion that I

was going through, emotions that I didn't even know how

to verbalize to other people. But it was Daily Hope

that helped me get out of bed every morning and

gave me the strength to get through each day. Through

your teaching on Daily Hope pastorrect, I was able to

experience God's love.

And power like never before. You know.

I even translated the Daily Hope devotional for my parents

who don't speak English, and they accepted Jesus too.

That's amazing, Delia.

I am so grateful for you and the team at

Daily Hope because it has become the morning routine that

I can't live without now. Delia, you have been through

more pain than I can possibly imagine, some very very

challenging times, and I'm sorry, I really am.

I'm sorry.

Sometimes we experience multiple traumas at the same time, and

when that happens, that's when we really need the hope

of Jesus Christ. And I'm so glad you experienced that,

that you found God's love and found God's power. And

what a blessing that you translated the daily hope devotionals

for your parents and then they accepted Christ. That's amazing.

I am celebrating with you that they are now in

the family of God. It's stories like yours that just

encourage me and keep me going. So thanks so much

for taking the time to write and share your story.

And by the way, anybody else listen. If you have

a story, please write me. I would love to read

it and love to share it if I can with others.

You'll encourage other people with your story. God bless you.

Thanks so much, Rick, And if you'd like to let

Rick know how much this broadcast has meant to you,

how it's blessed you, please send him an email at

Rick at pastorick dot com. That's Rick at pastorick dot com.

Rick looks so forward to reading those emails. Be sure

to join us next time as we look into God's.

Word for our daily hope.

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