For the last few weeks I have been studying the life of Peter. The amount of resources available on Peter are nowhere near as available as just about any other major character in the bible. However, his life is one of the most fascinating, in my opinion, out of all the other biblical characters.
Why then have so few went on the path of studying his life? I wonder if it’s the fact that the Catholics scare everyone away from talking about the real Peter (not the pope Peter, or “Saint Peter” the oneth in which the Catholics prayeth to in order to have more deep faith in Mary). Maybe it’s that at quick glance Peter seems like a big let-down because he’s always quick to speak, (usually saying something silly according to Jesus) seemingly lacking in faith and also in knowledge. Well I cannot say for sure. I can say that none of these things are true of Peter, also known as Simon or Simon Peter.
As you progress through scripture chronologically (at least in books where he is mentioned) you watch Peter grow up from being a faithless teenager to a wise godly-loving-husband who is murdered for Christ’s sake. As you really dig in to the lessons that Christ taught the disciples before he died you notice Peter, although sometimes maybe too quick to speak, does so in a way that shows that he is a trusted spokesperson for the rest of the disciples. On many occasions he is the guy answering Jesus’ tough questions and the rest of the disciples stand by his responses. Not once does even one of them say “well actually Peter I don’t know about that”. These were early signs of Peter’s gift of leadership.
Christ had many disciples, and many other people following him to try and catch him slipping up. He chose twelve specifically out of the large group he had around. The first name he said, and later would always say distinctively, was Peter. Peter was basically Jesus’ best friend. He was the only disciple to ever say ‘no’ to Jesus. He was rebuked the most harshly by Jesus. When Jesus first met Peter he quickly gave him a nickname, “The Rock” (which translated to our modern English names is where we get ‘Peter’ from). In fact, that was their whole first conversation. Jesus was introduced to Simon from his brother Andrew and Jesus only said “hey, you’re Peter now”, and goes on to do whatever else Jesus did that day.
Honestly there is so many amazing things that happened in Peter’s life that I cannot stop studying him. Even the things I have already mentioned briefly are far more significant and are deserving of much more content. So, I have decided to make a separate website just for that purpose. It’s currently under construction, but soon it will be live and ready where I will be publishing probably 1-2 articles a week in a mostly chronological breakdown of Peter’s life and why every event we know of his life is significant.