A recording of the Apr. 20, 2017 After Hours event for men, led by SHM co-founder, Doug Hartzheim. Enjoy finding yourself in the character and discussion of Saint Peter from the New Testament in these many passages. Get a bible ready!

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We started after hours back in September, and it’s a chance to get to meet some other people and all for all of us to recognize that we’re we’re humans on a journey and we’re trying to improve so that’s something that is marked by this place is trying to improve our own integrity. Living life with purpose and integrity is our tagline but you

More important to that, or what undergirds all of that is looking into the Bible, which are what those books are on your on your table there. So some of the guys who come to this have never opened the Bible, and that’s okay. That’s why this exists is to try to introduce the Bible to some people and talk about the God of the Bible, and his son Jesus, because the that, that that book has shaped history, and it’s shaped our lives, and it’s, it’s amazing. So anyways, that’s that’s what we’re going to do today. But we don’t expect that you just become join us in our faith in one conversation. And so if you have questions, if you have doubts, if you have criticisms of Christianity or the Bible, that’s okay, too. So this is the place and open forum to discuss at your tables tonight. And so let’s just respect everyone’s, where they’re coming from and that we’re all different.

Yeah, I’m going to introduce my dad, this my dad, his name is Doug. You’ve already heard from him. And he’s going to share some some things tonight from one of the main characters in the New Testament, the apostle, or St. Peter. So would you just give a round applause for my dad.

It’s our pleasure to meet with you

got some ground that we’re going to try to cover tonight.

I want to start by saying how much I value

the relationships in here, especially with you some of you younger guys.

It’s something that that I don’t take for granted. I appreciate it. And there’s probably really no way for me to express what you young men mean to probably a lot of guys that are my age, but I was in city brew a couple days ago. And I was just sitting there reading, reading through some of these verses. In right over here. There was two guys

sitting at a table and they were just getting along famously and I felt like one of the guys, I’m guessing they were probably late 20s, early 30s one of the guys was, I believe, having a issue with a girlfriend. I don’t know if he was going to break up with her. I don’t know about I tried not to listen. But I mean, they’re literally from from there, you know, in course, I kind of fell off my still, as he got into the gory details, but

you know, honestly, I wasn’t trying to hear it. I was just hoping I would hear the word pray about it, or it got involved or something like that, you know, I was hoping that I would hear something along those lines. But regardless of that,

it reminded me of it because he’s got there were buddies. And,

and the one guy really was emphasizing but the other one and in I felt that they looked at all appearances that they’re making a lot of progress and that they would spend many years as

Good friends, you know, it made me think back of those early days in my life when my wife and I were getting engaged, of course, it would have been earlier than that because we were really young when we got married. And,

and then all of those friendships that I had with my buddies in those days, you know, a lot of them got married, we were in each other’s weddings and just that whole thing, it was a great time of life. And so when I was in Cebu the other day, and those two guys were talking.

I was short on time, I really wanted to jump in and say, Hey, Wonderland and after hours and normally I do that because I’m not shy about that stuff. But I didn’t feel the Holy Spirit leading me to do that. But, and then I got a text message from Trent Dilfer, raise your hand Trent

yesterday. He said, Hey Doug, when is that once after hours and all that you know, because I can make it this month. Friends a realtor does a good job and as many

A lot to me, no.

Simple like that is, hey,

I want to I just want to know a little bit more about God, you know, I want to pursue the King of kings, you know, the creator. And so, I mean that text,

simple thing like that.

It just did something to me because I thought, wow, if everybody could just have that interest in that openness to want to know more about the God of the universe. And so

you know, that’s that’s kind of what I just wanted to lead in with. I appreciate you young men, how many guys here their wives have gone to work for wives or girlfriends at one point or another reason finally see that? Well, that’s good. I, it always intrigues me that there’s a good balance there between this group and that group. And when we have a bigger space, we’re going to mix it up, everyone’s gonna get everybody together. That’d be kind of fun. And then for your wives that don’t go to that you can bring them but we’re going to do here

Tonight is we’re going to go to Peter. But we’re going to look at about eight or 10 verses. And I’m going to have each table, take a verse or maybe two, and discuss it on your own. And then we’re going to come back and talk about it as a group, to me a little different tonight. But what I want to emphasize is kind of what Daniel said earlier is, you know, we’re all on a journey. We don’t haven’t figured out you don’t have all the answers. So what if you took the wisest person on earth, the deep, most deepest spiritual person on the planet, that guy don’t know the answers, and probably probably got half of them wrong and thinks he’s got them, right. So it’s all about trust and faith and taking those small steps to go on your journey. So as we look at these

verses, Daniels got a number there’s 12 verses here, and we get 10 tables or what 123456789 so

we’re gonna we’re going to have a

A couple tables, take some extra verses because I want to go through here and catch all these verses. So in Luke five, this is where Jesus calls Peter. And the reason it says here, he sees this fame next to the Holy One. He grabbed these grabs boat, got all these people follow him around because of all the miracles he’s been doing, takes a boat just off shore and starts teaching.

But one of the things he did in that conversation, he says, Hey, you guys, this is how you should fish you know, try it over here in Peter course pipes up and says, Now we’ve been fishing all night. You know, kind of like, I don’t know if it was a difference buffalo or what? But he said, you know, not worth it. But they did it in fill their nets. And when Peter realizes that that is maybe the Holy One. His response to that was like of guilt and shame, you know, he just didn’t feel good enough to be in his presence. So we’re going to talk about that.

Then another time.

I’m in Matthew 14, Lord of Jesus, they’re out in the water. And they’re going from one side of lake to the other. Well, Jesus had not gotten in the boat with with the guys. And now he comes walking to them on the water. Will Peter be and Peter says, If that’s you, Lord, I want to do that, you know,

tell me to come. And so he walks out there. You may know that story. He had the faith. He believed that Jesus was who He said He was. But somewhere out there his faith wavered, and he fall down, fell in the water. And Jesus said, you know, where did you go? And then we’re going to talk about in Matthew 16, where Jesus says, Who do you say that I am? He said, First he says, who did the people say that I am? he asked his disciples and then he asked Peter, what do you say that?

I want to know who do you think I am?

Am I the Messiah or not? In your mind, are you there yet? And this wonderful confession of price comes back from Peter and it says

It’s a special moment.

Matthew 16. Jesus predicts his death. What’s going to happen? It’s gonna die. He’s gonna raise, raise again in three days. Peter loves Jesus. It’s not we’re not gonna let that happen, you can’t do that. And when he did that, Peter said, You still don’t get it.

I’ve been telling you guys that I’m going to have to die for mankind. And he said, if, if you’ll,

if you don’t get out of my way, you can’t you really can’t be on this team. This is where we’re going is pretty, pretty deep

place and I need you to believe in this.

And so, and then he and then in Matthew 17. The transfiguration. It’s called the Transfiguration because as Jesus goes up on the mountain, he takes his inner circle and he takes Peter in john the guy, three guys, and he goes up on the mountain, and he says,

and then they have a meeting with God. And I’m gonna let you guys read that one to us, but that’s

Stories kind of a crack up the you know, Peter just nervous energy, you know and he he starts talking and wanting to build altars and shelters and stuff and then in this cloud envelops him and the presence of God envelops and and that’s where that’s where God says you know hey this is my beloved Son

and then it almost he almost he yells at it feels like listening in the middle Peter nervous energy. I don’t know what he’s being Peter. And the goal tonight is for us to see our own characteristics and some of the things that Peter you know, our nature to control, or the anxiety that we might have nervousness the the take charge thing not trusting God, things like that.

And then, Lord, how many times should I forgive my brother when he sins against me? up to seven times, and then Jesus courses about 70 times seven. In other words, don’t ever stop forgiving. You know, it’s it’s

A good place to be. But that’s Peter. He just wants to know the answer. He’s trying to get to the bottom of it.

And then, in john 13,

Jesus was washing the disciples feet. But Jesus essentially took on the position of a slave,

puts a tunic around him, gets down on his hands and feet in washes the most dirty part of the human body, just like they would have slaves doing these days. So he comes to Peter, Peter says, You can’t wash my feet, you’re gonna wash my feet. He said, You never gonna wash my feet, because you are God. You know. And

Jesus rebukes and says,

You can’t have any part of my kingdom, then I can’t serve you. You can’t be a part of my kingdom. And so, so much like Peter, he says, probably wash all on me, on the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. I mean, you can just wash me clean and that humility is what

Every one of us has defined to follow God. You cannot make a decision to follow Christ in the simplest form. If you’re too proud to say, Lord, I’m going to open up my life to you. I need you.

I need guidance. I need help. I need to want to be committed. But there’s a there’s a,

there’s a piece of mail of humility that has Divya. And it was there for every one of you that ever made that decision. And pride keeps us away from that, because we got this image or, you know, we’ve got 100 different things going on. But it’s an identity thing. I was talking to Sam ago and it’s like, well, what’s your identity in visiting Jesus? Or is it in your big truck with the big wheels? You know, don’t mean to be too sarcastic, but, but there’s a zillion things. They’ll come and steal our attention. And then we’ll get so obsessed with that thing that that’s kind of our do our job. Yeah, I work here. I was

It’s it’s fun i like i like the guys and we’re, you know the team that we have.

Is that your does your identity beginning in work? Or maybe it’s your wife who knows could be your family. But how about Jesus Christ because that’s, that’s going to lay down his life and is mapping out eternity.

And then a Matthew 26, you will fall away. You’re all going to fall away from me tonight. This is coming up on the garden, excuse me. He says, They are my Follow me. I love that. He points it all buddies, they might fall away. I’m not falling with you. I will never fall away. And Jesus says, well, you’re going to deny me three times before the rooster crows. Morning. So that’s just Peter. He’s doing his thing.

Then he falls asleep in the garden when Jesus asked him to pray. And when when Jesus comes back, the toughest night of Jesus’s life is about to be resting. And he says, not to all the disciples. He’s talking to all of them.

He calls out the year. He’s counting. Jesus was counting on you to build church on him. You’re sleeping, you know. So you can kind of get I’m just trying to give you a snapshot of Peter, right? In the humanists of this guy.

And

then it was Peter, I love that mark Ford 1454

he gets arrested. They haul him off the office and all the chief priests I mean, the, the Pharisees and all that and and they’re about to, and they’re out for blood, they’re going to kill this, Jesus.

I know where all the other disciples when the peer kind of gets in the entourage. Kind of like that guy that stole Tom Brady’s super soldier. He just kind of they just kind of walked in there, you know, and

thinks he can get away with that but it shows a little bit of courage but he’s in the kind of this in the fringe there that kangaroo court and and then they spot him and course he does that.

denied Jesus before the morning and finally in john 21 one of my favorite stories when they see Jesus out there all out fishing again and

let you guys read that one but he when they when john says hey, it’s Jesus Peters the one that doesn’t waste a second man he’s, you know, grabs his robe puts it on so he’s at least somewhat decent when it gets to show and runs the show. And I’d love to know what that

what a deal that was. So I got let’s let’s just go around the room. So if you would take verse number one, if you would be so kind is to actually open these Bibles and let’s dig into it. Let’s let’s, let’s learn some stuff. You get this Trent. If your table do number one, and Zach if you guys do, verse number two, dirt you guys go with verse number three, and then

back there in the back. Okay, so that’s number

And john, you guys be number five verse number five, you guys would be six. Aaron, you guys are seven.

Jacob, you guys would be nine and then Elijah, you guys would be 10 and

somebody else take.

Well, I missed you. Okay, so what number Am I loving?

Did I miss a number?

Hey, call out your numbers 12456789 your 10 and then who wants to do 11 anybody else don’t do number 11

Let me take 11 for me.

Okay, they’re going to do one in 11 and I need to

Somebody do 12 you’ll do 12. Okay, so discusses now,

Daniel, if you could give me that other

slide that shows the objectives here.

I need that.

Okay, if I can have your attention for about 20 seconds.

Okay, we’re calling this a matter of perspective. Peter saw himself as well, sometimes capable, sometimes independent. Sometimes he sees himself as extremely loyal, brave, and then other times, he’s a washing guilt and shame and he’s a sinner of failure and unworthy. Right? And that could be any one of us. And then, but how does God see Peter, we’re going to leave this up here. God sees Peter By the way, God sees all of us as His children.

He sees them as human, as frail as dependent

What a contrast. Right? dependent on God to be effective. God sees

theatre as empowered and emboldened by the power of the Holy Spirit is chosen servant to lead. So God sees us in Eyes Only God can see through, right?

Our job is to is to shut ourselves of the enemy and the guilt, the shame. He wants us to see ourselves as trash Jesus to say, No, you guys are treasure. Okay, so as you go through your verses

think of this. And everybody got the verses if not holler and we’ll switch it back. And then we’ll come back and I’ll have each table share.

Oh, you gotta go back. You get to you get the gist of it. How does God see us? And how do we see ourselves okay.

I want to move forward just in closing here, where it says

that

in Acts chapter four,

Peter and john had healed this guy that have been sick for Zika 38 or 43 years in. He was a blind man since birth. He was a beggar at the outskirts of the gate outskirts of the city at the gate. And he’s crippled. He says he was crippled from birth.

And

and so they heal him and then they take a lot of heat from the Pharisees and all the guys that don’t want them to do anything in Jesus name. Peter lays into him starts preaching. This is the same Peter that we just went through his whole life, his whole Christian life and his walk with Jesus the ups and the downs, and the vacillations and the humaneness of Peter, and yet the goodness that would Jesus saw in him and wanted him to build his church decided to

This church through Peter. So, now fast forward.

Jesus isn’t on the earth anymore. He’s ascended into heaven. He rose on the third day. And Peter’s busy at it. And so now they’re, they’re ready to arrest Peter. And they couldn’t try him. They got nothing but a bunch of fraudulent testimony against Peter and john. But one thing is said, it says when they saw the courage of Peter and john, and this is what I want you to hear and realize that they were unschooled, ordinary men. They were astonished, and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.

And so I don’t care.

If the devil is going to try to get me down and say you’re only these things over here, you’re not brave, you’re not loyal. You’re a monkey. You’re a sinner of failure and you’re unworthy.

You know what I want to do? I want to I want to spend time with Jesus

and interested in

Because I’m on school, I’m an ordinary guy.

And it says here that they took note. So we all have a reputation. That blog I sent out this last week talks about, I always told our kids, you know, hey, we create our reputations. They are what they are, because we generated them, you know, and

that if I do have an image, when that’d be a great image to have, the people would, would know that you spent time with Jesus. You know, that’s one that’s the one we’re looking for.

And you know what it takes to do that. It takes a little commitment, little time in His Word. I’ve heard this my whole life, but only more in recent years. I think I’ve appreciated it more.

But I want to be known for having spent time with Jesus. And

and I believe that, that there’s guys in this room today that maybe have never really thought too much about

Really yielding

to God mean as you go through the motions, I talked about that last month when verint got done talking, you know,

it’s so easy to just start going through the motions, we go to work, we get up, we do our things always go to church, you know, we go snowmobiling and mountain and whatever we do, a year goes by, you know, like kids have been married six years already. All of them now got married and four months of each other. But, uh, you know,

six years have gone by my grandkids, oldest ones, five years old now. And what are we doing with what we’ve been given? You know,

and we need to be better receivers. And we need to be in a position to

maybe redirect our life and avail ourselves to the teaching of the most powerful man that ever lived. In fact, God himself and you can do that, you know, the most elementary person here the most, the one that’s the newest to any of this talk that comes out of the Bible.

I’ve seen it happen. We’re in

They say, you know, it makes sense. And I know what and I don’t understand all of it. I’m jumping in, and just gonna ask God to help me. You know,

and if you if you exercise that simple trust, he does the rest, he makes up for the gap, the knowledge gap and the emotional gap and spiritual, you know, we just never will have all of that. But by God Himself, we got to start with that first step, right. And I know there’s guys here that struggle with that. You look at your peer group, and they’re not into this. There’s always 100 things. But just like Peter, the apostle Paul, and anybody in the Scripture, that’s a hero. They had to come to a point of humility and trust and say, I want to give this a try. I want to believe in this. So it starts with a step, you know, so get with one of your buddies, and just say, hey, I need some help. Let’s walk through this together. That’s a good place to be some of you may have to change your circle of friends. That’s just the way it is. You know,

because they’ll hold you down. They give 100 reasons why they want

You’re in their little drinking club or whatever it might be the things that may not be godly things. But I think that the main thing is, is if you will try to begin to understand how much God has made provision for you loves you and sacrifice his only son for you and get a glimpse of the love he has for you only then will you start to become get to a place where you can reciprocate and trust those the kind of the knowledge and the receiving of His love. That’s the catalyst. You know if we’ll just do that life,

but looks out. So anyway, but let’s go Thanks for coming. Let’s have a word of prayer.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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