INFLUENCE

Eric C. Burr

John 1: 40-42; 18: 15-17, 25-27; 21: 1-6, 21,22

Some impression came to me, as to these scriptures, of the way in which influence entered into the life of Peter. What our beloved brother has just spoken about is the greatest influence which is available to the believer inwardly at the present time. Not that the Spirit Himself is to be spoken of just as an influence, the Spirit is a Person and He works, His deity is characteristic of power and although He may graciously come and dwell in people like you and me, He is however, God, and the seriousness of what our brother has drawn attention to as to the possibility of hindering Him, or of quenching or of grieving Him in any other way, is to be very seriously regarded because of who He is as God. I expect everybody else is like me in this, that we do not give enough honour and place to the Holy Spirit day by day. He is to be honoured and we are to make ourselves susceptible to what He would lead us in. One thing He will do is that He will lead us to Jesus.

I was thinking about Peter and the way he comes under the influence of other men. I was struck by this because I could have read more scriptures still, to bear on the way in which Peter comes under the influence of other men. It is interesting in Genesis 24, that the servant, to speak of the literality of that scripture, will not come under the influence of Laban. Laban says stay ten days, and he says, no, send me away to my master, see v 56. He will not be susceptible to the influence of other men. But Peter is.

In the first scripture I read in chapter 1 Peter comes under very good influence. He comes under that of a man who has heard the voice of Jesus; one of the two who heard Him. His brother Andrew goes away and says what he has found and then it says, “And he led him to Jesus”. What better influence than that could there be! How could we influence one another better than by leading one another to Jesus? It is always well to bear in mind the little anecdote; ‘I was converted by Mr So and so, and they said, No, you were not converted by him, you were converted through him’. Through Andrew, Peter is brought to Jesus. He is led to Jesus, He does not give any commands or dictate to him, he leads Him to Jesus. You see the power of influence in a positive way. I would hardly need to encourage the brethren to seek to be like that, to be both influential and susceptible to that kind of influence, the kind of influence that leads you to Jesus.

Much could be said about the other scriptures I have read, but in chapter 18 Peter comes under another influence – the influence of another brother, not his own brother but a man who was very close himself to the Lord Jesus. He is referred to here as ‘the other disciple’, but it is himself, the disciple that Jesus loved, and he has this special access because He knew the high priest. It says, “Now Simon Peter followed Jesus, and the other disciple. But that disciple was known to the high priest”. He had access into a place where perhaps he himself would have been safe, but he influenced Peter. It is as if, instead of leading Peter to Jesus - of course Jesus is already in the hands of the Romans - he leads him into a place that Peter is not able to sustain. What a thing to do; and we do it innocently, we influence one another in ways in which we had the best intentions, but we lead someone else into a place that they could not sustain. I refer to this because we are susceptible to all kinds of influences. One thing I remark about this is that it was a brother. Transferring it to our day, it was another brother and Peter came under his influence and he was led into a position not only that he could not sustain, but which created a trap for him, brought into an environment where even a young girl influenced him and he was lead into circumstances where he denied Jesus. How sad! The first of the apostle, “first Peter”, and here is the first of the apostles denying Jesus in front of people like this. Having done it once, he went in and warmed himself by the fire, a very nice warm comfortable influence, and having denied him once, it says again that he warmed himself. There is an influence of this kind that is pervasive. I draw attention to it because we are all susceptible to influence, but we need to be careful what influence we submit ourselves to, even from the brethren. That was John, submitting to influence a brother which led that one into circumstances into which Peter would not have wished.

In chapter 21 Peter is the one who influences. You would have thought he would have learnt better. It says “After these things Jesus manifested himself again to the disciples” and instead of maintaining in his mind the fact that Jesus was there alive, Peter says “I go to fish”, and he took these other six people with him. His influence embraced more than half the apostles. Think of the spread of an influence like that: he influenced these others and the whole mission under that influence was abortive. The very purpose for which he had gone and influenced them failed. “I go to fish”, and he spent all the night, and they toiled and they caught nothing. The influence was abortive. How was the situation remedied? Jesus stood on the shore and He took command. He did not reprove anybody or anything like that; He just took command of the situation. It is far better to let the Lord take command of the situation than to let anything else influence us, or anyone else influence us, and it draws us back to the question whether I have personal links with the Lord Jesus.

We have come not to like the word, but one thing we need is independent links with Christ. That is links that are not dependent on someone else’s links with Him, but links of our own with the Lord Jesus. I expect everybody here knows but, beloved, nurture your independent links with the Lord. Do not give up the brethren, do not depart from them, do not diminish the value of them, but make Christ first, let Him come in and stand on the shore and take command. They were all the better for it.

Mr Lyon used to say, perhaps quote, about Peter, ‘night, nakedness and nothing’, and that is what it was. But when Jesus comes in there is a fire with fish laid on it and bread, and He says, “Bring of the fishes which ye have not taken” (v 10). Jesus gave them that meal. What a meal it was! But Peter is not quite clear. Jesus speaks to them, he tests Peter about do you love me, and Peter asserts that He loves the Lord. But he is still concerned about what is going to happen to another man. There is a brotherly way in that, “Lord, and what of this man?” - there is brother - and sisterly regard for the way in which we think about one another - but Peter is not entirely free about the principle of influence in relation to somebody else, “Lord, and what of this man?” and there is hardly a more dismissive remark from Jesus than this, “what is that to thee? Follow thou me” - you follow Me yourself!

I did not want to read any more scripture but I just refer to two others. In Galatians Peter is still susceptible to influence; he has not finally learned the lesson that you must have the lesson from Jesus. How all this comes into our daily lives, into our assembly lives, into our administrative lives, all these things, it comes into them all! Peter has not yet learned the lesson of what has happened because Christ has been glorified. When some came from James and the circumcision question was raised, Peter falls to their influence. You see how hard it is to learn that you draw your influence from Christ, even when you get older. But in the end Peter comes to it, he says, “The Lord Jesus Christ has manifested to me”, not the disciple whom Jesus loved, or Andrew or anybody like that. He says, the Lord Jesus Christ has manifested it to me. There He is subject to one influence and you can tell from that verse in his epistle that that is now a controlling influence in his life that the Lord Jesus Christ has manifested to me. Most of us would say, what a pity we did not recognise that earlier in our lives. Peter is about to put off his tabernacle, but he says, one thing I know now, I know what the Lord Jesus Christ has ‘manifested to me’. Beloved, may we learn it early and may we learn that the Lord has given us brethren and company in order to help us and support us and strengthen us, above all He has given us the Spirit, but let us be sure that the prime influence and direction in our lives is ‘from the Lord Jesus Christ as He has manifested to me’, and He says to Peter, “Follow thou me”, an independent bond with Christ, security. May the Lord help us!

 

LONDON

9 January 2001