Having arrested Him, they led Him away and brought Him to the house of the high priest; but Peter was following at a distance. (Luke 22:54 NASB)

Peter tried to follow what was happening to Christ without being seen.  One of the gravest mistakes we can make is to try and follow Jesus from a distance.

If we walk down that road of not being seen or heard for Christ, it can eventually lead us to deny him.  In times where following Christ can put us in an uncomfortable or precarious situation, we can start to distance ourselves from him.  We don’t outright deny Christ, we just begin to be silent and become a sort of a secret Christian.  We never receive the power to live for him by distancing ourselves from him.  If we become more and more silent, in a moment of weakness, we can find ourselves denying him.  There is no status quo in the Kingdom of God, we are either moving towards Christ or away from him.

I wish I could tell you that I have always had victory in this area, but I would be lying to you if I did.  I can remember numerous times where I should have spoken up for Christ, but I didn’t.  My sin was not of co-mission, but of omission.  It was not what I did but what I didn’t do.  In spite of my weakness, I have found, like Peter did, that God always gives us another chance.  God understands our frailty and gives us grace in time of our need.

God is our strength.  We never receive the grace to live for Christ by moving away from him but towards him.

I worked for seventeen years as a missionary with Youth With A Mission.  My missionary work has taken me to Mexico, Canada, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Spain, and Ukraine.  I hold a Masters of Education in curriculum and instruction from Virginia Commonwealth University.  [email protected]