How Jesus restores broken lives and empowers ordinary people for kingdom purpose.
You were not merely saved from something; you were transformed for something.
Throughout this series, Peter’s story has shown us how Jesus takes ordinary, imperfect lives and changes them. Peter’s path was a path of transformation: from failure to restoration, from shame to a new identity, from fear to boldness, from weakness to power, from isolation to community, from prayerlessness to prevailing faith, and from the ordinary to the extraordinary.
That transformation did not turn Peter into a spiritual celebrity. There are no super saints. Only ordinary men and women who surrender to Jesus and keep following Him despite their weakness. We are all a mixture of success and failure, and God can use it all. In His hands, even our failures can become part of our formation.
Peter’s story is not only his story. It is the pattern of what Jesus does in everyone who surrenders to Him. In Christ, we have been loved, forgiven, restored, favored, and empowered for purpose. I would not be here apart from His grace, and neither would any of us. We have been empowered to carry Jesus into the world—not fearfully, but full of faith; humble, yet bold as lions in Christ.
A Living Hope and an Unfading Inheritance
Years after his worst failure, Peter wrote as a man who knew God’s mercy firsthand. In 1 Peter 1:3-9, he blessed “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” who, in His abundant mercy, “has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” He described an inheritance that is incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading, reserved in heaven for believers who are kept by the power of God through faith.
Peter also acknowledged the reality of grief and trials. Faith can be tested by fire, yet genuine faith is more precious than gold. Although we have not seen Jesus, we love Him. Although we do not see Him now, we believe and rejoice “with joy inexpressible and full of glory,” receiving the outcome of faith: the salvation of our souls.
This passage is beautiful because it came through a man who knew what it meant to fail, be forgiven, and be restored. Peter knew that our hope is living because Jesus is alive. He knew that we are kept not by the strength of our own grip on God, but by God’s power as we trust Him.
When discouragement settles over us, we need to return to passages like this. Our trials are real, but they are temporary. Our inheritance is eternal. Our failures are not our final definition. Grace is still writing our future.
Jesus Restores Broken People
Peter denied Jesus three times. He had insisted that he would remain loyal even if everyone else fell away, yet when pressure came, he crumbled. He denied even knowing the Lord. Then, ashamed and discouraged, he went back to fishing.
After the resurrection, Jesus met Peter on the shore in John 21. Three times Jesus asked, “Do you love Me?” and three times He entrusted Peter with an assignment: “Feed My sheep.” Jesus did not lead with, “Why did you fail Me?” He restored Peter where love was restored.
Many of us have known another kind of correction—the kind that uses shame as motivation. I remember a brilliant chemistry teacher from high school. He taught so well that when I reached college, I could take a CLEP test and receive credit for the only chemistry class required for my engineering degree. I passed by one point, but I passed. He was an excellent instructor.
His classroom manner, however, could be brutal. He would sit near the overhead projector, peer over his glasses, and call on a student to solve an equation. If the student answered incorrectly, he might say, “What? Are you stupid? Can somebody else answer, because obviously he doesn’t know what he’s doing?” He used humiliation to push students toward improvement.
But shame-based encouragement is still shame-based. It is destructive, not restorative. Jesus did not shame Peter back into service. He brought Peter back through love. “Peter, do you love Me?” Restoration begins where love is restored.
That is how God drew me. A fear of judgment may have caught my attention, but the revelation that changed me was God’s love: “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” Jesus did not merely die for humanity in the abstract; He loved me and gave Himself for me. He wanted to restore my life and make it matter in this world.
Grace is rewriting your future—not your failures, not your past mistakes, and not the labels others have placed on you. You will probably stumble again somewhere along the way. When you do, run back into His arms; do not run away from Him. First John 1:9 promises that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That is the efficacy of the blood of Christ. His grace is enough.
Jesus Gives Us a New Identity
Peter was no longer merely Simon, the wavering man. Jesus called him Peter, the rock. In Christ, our old nature is rendered powerless, and the new life of God is released within us. We do not have to live from shame, fear, or old labels. We live from union with Christ. We have passed from death to life.
We should live for Christ, pursue righteousness, and give ourselves to good works, but those things do not save us. We are saved because the Son of God came from heaven to earth, walked among us, died in our place, and rose from the dead. His finished work secures us. If we wander or stumble, our loving Father calls us home.
So we must ask ourselves: What old identity must I finally stop agreeing with?
I am glad I did not agree with the chemistry teacher’s question, “Are you stupid?” Even at sixteen or seventeen, I knew his accusation did not define me. Yet many people carry an old verdict spoken by a teacher, parent, spouse, authority figure, or their own inner voice: “You will never amount to anything.” “You are a failure.” “You always ruin everything.”
Stop agreeing with what Jesus died to remove. Bring that old label to Christ and let it die. Your truest identity is not rooted in your past but in your union with Him: beloved, forgiven, restored, and called. Peter later described believers as living stones being built together into a spiritual house and as a royal priesthood called to proclaim God’s praises (1 Peter 2:4-10). The wavering fisherman learned to live from a new identity, and so can we.
Community Strengthens Purpose
Peter also moved from isolation into community. The early Church gathered, prayed, broke bread, shared life, cared for those in need, and advanced the gospel together. The Church is not merely an event to attend; it is a spiritual family to belong to.
We are living stones, and living stones are built together. Purpose is strengthened in community and weakened in isolation. God certainly works in each of us personally, but He does not empower us only for a private relationship with Him. He joins us to the body of Christ, where different ages, races, backgrounds, personalities, gifts, and callings reflect His wisdom together.
Paul described the Church in Ephesians 3:10 as the display of God’s manifold—multifaceted—wisdom. It is like a diamond with many faces catching the light from different directions. Through the Church, that wisdom is made known even to rulers and principalities. That means our lives, joined together in Christ, matter far beyond what we can see.
The early believers also learned to pray together until faith prevailed. Their shared life became the environment in which courage grew, needs were met, leaders emerged, and the Word spread. We need one another if we are going to become all that God intends.
Favor Is Given for Assignment
God’s favor is not merely for personal comfort. Favor is empowering grace for kingdom purpose. Joseph’s story reminds us that favor can be present even when it is hidden inside preparation. Joseph was favored in his father’s house, in Potiphar’s house, in prison, and ultimately in Pharaoh’s court. The circumstances changed, but God’s hand remained on him. In the end, favor placed Joseph where he could preserve many lives (Genesis 37-50).
Favor opens doors, strengthens us through hardship, and makes us conduits of blessing. We are blessed to be a blessing. The favor Peter and the early Church received was not permission to become self-important; it was grace for an assignment. God gave them credibility, courage, relationships, and open doors so they could bear witness to Jesus and serve people.
The same is true for us. Whatever influence, opportunity, resource, gift, or relationship God entrusts to us is not meant to stop with us. Favor flows through us toward the people God wants to love, restore, and reach.
The Word and the Spirit Transform Us
On the beach, Jesus gave Peter a word: “Feed My sheep.” That word restored Peter’s calling and gave direction to his future. But the word was not separated from the Spirit. God works through His Word and His Spirit together.
Most people do not come to Christ because they awaken one morning with an unexplained spiritual sensation.
Somewhere, they hear the good news of Jesus. The message of Scripture reaches them, or God brings a particular word to their heart. That word begins to stir faith. When God calls, assigns, and sends us, He often gives us a word to carry.
Transformation then unfolds over a lifetime. God’s Word begins the process and continues it. At different stages, He may add fresh understanding or direction to the original calling. The Holy Spirit breathes on that Word until it becomes living reality in us.
Peter had the word, but Acts 2 records what happened next. The disciples waited together in the upper room; the Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost, and what looked like tongues of fire rested on them. Peter, who had denied Jesus in fear, stood and proclaimed Jesus in power. Three thousand people responded, and the Church was born. Pentecost changed everything.
A momentary touch from heaven can propel a person forward, but transformation by the Spirit is also a process. The Spirit works with the Word over years, renewing our minds, transforming our attitudes, shaping our character, and preparing us for greater responsibility. There may be an initial encounter and other fresh fillings along the way. Acts 4, for example, shows believers who had already experienced Pentecost praying again, being filled with the Holy Spirit, and speaking the Word of God with boldness.
The Word gives foundation and direction. The Spirit gives life and power. We need both.
The Holy Spirit Empowers Purpose
The fourth and final theme in Peter’s empowerment for purpose is new acts. Acts 2:43 says that many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. In the early Church, God’s power was openly displayed.
Anointed at Pentecost, Peter and the other disciples received power from heaven and began to experience Christ’s resurrection life in ministry. God’s empowerment moved Peter from human reasoning and carnal behavior into Spirit-led kingdom service. Thousands were saved, and miraculous healings followed. Acts 5:15 even records that people carried the sick into the streets so that Peter’s shadow might fall on some of them. The Greek word skia can carry the sense of a shadow, reflection, or copy. The point was never that Peter possessed power of his own. Christ’s presence had marked his life so deeply that people reached for any point of contact with what God was doing.
This is what happens when ordinary people are filled with an extraordinary God. The Holy Spirit gives boldness, discernment, revelation, power, and love. We need His power in our generation to overcome hardship and evil, fulfill our calling, and advance God’s kingdom.
We have not seen every person healed when we prayed, but disappointment does not require us to conclude that God has stopped performing miraculous works, signs, and wonders. God is still God. He can break into any situation with saving, healing, and delivering power. There has been one Pentecost, but there have been many fresh outpourings of the Spirit throughout the life of the Church.
Stephen: Full of Faith and Power
The story did not stop with Peter and the Twelve. Acts 6:1-8 shows how the Spirit’s life spread through ordinary believers as the early Church grew.
A complaint arose because Greek-speaking widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. The apostles asked the congregation to choose seven people of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, to oversee the work. They would care for this practical need while the apostles continued in prayer and the ministry of the Word.
The Church chose Stephen and six others. Acts 6:5 describes Stephen as “a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit.” The apostles prayed and laid hands on them. Then the Word of God spread, the number of disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and many priests became obedient to the faith. Verse 8 adds, “And Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and signs among the people.” He was full of faith and the Holy Spirit; power followed.
Years ago, while discussing this passage, Carolyn observed that perhaps no one should be appointed even to serve as a deacon or elder unless that person is full of the Holy Spirit, full of faith, and full of power. Her comment still challenges me. The Church can become preoccupied with platforms and positions, but Stephen first carried God’s presence into service.
Sometimes people want a platform before they have power, or a position before they have cultivated His presence. Jesus invites us first to come away, sit at His feet, and be with Him. Ministry grows from communion.
Stephen’s assignment began with caring for widows, but the Spirit’s work in him could not be confined to a job description. He became a bold witness. Even when he was stoned, he looked into heaven and saw Jesus, and he entrusted himself to God. He was an ordinary believer who became extraordinary through surrender.
That is what extraordinary may look like for us. It may not mean becoming famous in the eyes of the world or even the Church. It may be an act of humble service that no crowd ever sees. It may mean becoming the best person in Christ we can be for our families, friends, congregation, neighbors, and coworkers. The question is not whether the assignment looks impressive. The question is whether we are full of faith, available to the Spirit, and faithful where God places us.
Presence Before Platform
We are united with Christ through the power of His resurrection and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. We must learn to live from this reality and from His presence. As we abide with Him daily in prayer, in His Word, and in our walk, His desires become ours. Faith increases, and our prayers become more confident.
Our confidence, however, is not confidence in ourselves. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3:4-6 NLT:
We are confident of all this because of our great trust in God through Christ. It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualification comes from God. He has enabled us to be ministers of his new covenant. This is a covenant not of written laws, but of the Spirit. The old written covenant ends in death; but under the new covenant, the Spirit gives life.
This protects us from two opposite errors. Pride says, “I have arrived; I am somebody because God has used me.” False humility says, “God could never use me, so I will not step out, pray for anyone, share Christ, or obey a difficult assignment.” The truth is that our sufficiency comes from God. We are not qualified on our own, yet He has qualified and enabled us to serve.
Paul wrote those words to believers in a church with serious problems. They were not perfect, yet they were ministers of the new covenant. Neither are we perfect. There are no super saints, only ordinary people who say yes to Jesus. His Word works in us, His Spirit works in us, and we are transformed—even while He continues to form our character.
The source of God’s power is not somewhere “out there.” Christ dwells within us and clothes us with His Spirit. Ephesians 3:20 reminds us that God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or think, according to His power at work in us. The Holy Spirit does not merely comfort believers; He empowers believers for mission.
When the Fire of God Becomes Personal
I have experienced seasons when the Spirit’s presence became unusually tangible. Those moments did not replace Scripture, character, or daily obedience. They awakened hunger and redirected my life.
In the early 1990s, while we were living in Florida, reports spread of an outpouring connected with the ministry of South African evangelist Rodney Howard-Browne. Meetings were held at Carpenter’s Home Church in Lakeland, a massive auditorium that was unusual in American church life at the time. People traveled from many places because they were being saved, refreshed, healed, and deeply affected by the Spirit. Some experienced laughter or other physical manifestations that many observers found strange.
Another pastor, another brother, and I drove from Melbourne to Lakeland for a day. I had already ministered overseas and seen God work, but some of what I witnessed in these meetings stretched my understanding of how God can move. We stood in a line for prayer. I told the Lord I wanted more of Him, but I did not feel anything dramatic. Tim, the pastor who had driven us, also appeared unaffected at first. Then he became so unsteady that we had to help carry him out, and someone else needed to drive home. It was my first close view of how unexpectedly God might touch someone.
Later, similar renewal spread through meetings led by Randy Clark, a Vineyard pastor who had been deeply touched at meetings in Tulsa. Randy was invited to minister at a Vineyard church in Toronto in 1994, and the Holy Spirit moved powerfully. People came from around the world. Critics sometimes called it the “laughing revival,” but behind the unusual manifestations were marriages being restored, people being healed, and lives being filled afresh with the Spirit.
That summer, while we were on furlough from missionary work in Haiti, Carolyn and I attended a ministers’ meeting in Toronto. Our daughter was only a few months old, and my sister graciously watched the children at the hotel. Carolyn is warm and loving but also highly organized and not prone to excess. As people prayed, I watched her fall to the floor and shake as though she had been connected to an electrical current.
Then one of the pastors looked at the usher behind me and said, “Grab his belt.” I had never needed anyone to hold my belt before prayer, but I soon understood. As they prayed, I felt electrified and intensely hot in the presence of God. I was thirty-four and in good physical condition, yet I began running in place so forcefully that the usher struggled to hold me. I felt as if I might sprint across the auditorium.
As I ran in place, I began to prophesy: “Run. The hour is late. Run.” It continued until I lost my voice and finally collapsed, soaked with sweat. I could not have known it then, but that encounter placed me on a trajectory that changed my life. It deepened the urgency to make mission trips, preach revival meetings, and participate in evangelistic work while I had the strength and opportunity.
Nearly forty years have passed, and it has passed more quickly than I could imagine. We should not recklessly abandon our responsibilities, but we should ask now, “Lord, what do You want me to do in my church, my community, and this season? How can I be Your hands and feet? How can I carry the flame of Your love?”
In January 1995, renewal meetings came to Melbourne. Our former pastor was healed during that season. I served on the ministry team, praying for people late into the night. I remember a tall Presbyterian pastor who didn’t want to attend but came at his family’s urging. While another brother and I gently prayed for him, he fell and shook under the power of God. His life was transformed. The skeptic became a leader of a pastors’ prayer group in the community and carried a burden for revival for years.
One night around midnight, during those January 1995 meetings, after I had prayed for many others, I asked three friends—Chris, a missionary who still serves in Guatemala, and Brian and Ann—to pray a simple prayer of refreshing over me. They did not have ministry badges, so we moved into a corner. Their prayer was quiet and sweet: “Lord, bless Bob and Carolyn, bless their daughter, and bless their work in Haiti.” God does not require volume or drama to move.
Suddenly, the same fire I had felt in Toronto came upon me again, but no one was there to catch me. I fell to the floor and began laughing uncontrollably. I remember lying curled up, overwhelmed by the presence of God, thinking, “This is the part I did not want. The running and prophesying were manageable, but now everyone will think I am crazy.” My three friends did not know what to do, so they left me in the corner.
About forty-five minutes later, a friend named Ted found me. He said, “Bob, the Spirit is all over you. You have to pray for people.” I could barely stand, so he held me as we approached a line of people. In my mind I protested that I was a trained, responsible person: I had a bachelor’s degree in engineering and a master’s degree in theology, though I had not yet earned my doctorate. Yet I could not even form a proper prayer. I did not lay hands on anyone. As I came near people, they began falling under the power of God. The experience made one truth unmistakable: our sufficiency is not from ourselves.
A retired New York City police officer named Vaughn stood nearby. His petite wife came forward for prayer. Before I touched her, she fell, weeping as God ministered to her. Vaughn was angry and started toward us, ready to defend her. Before he reached us, he crashed across two rows of chairs and ended up face down on the floor. He later said God confronted him for nearly interrupting the healing He was doing in his wife’s heart. Their lives were so changed that they later went to Haiti, lived in our former house after we left, and continued serving as missionaries in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
On another especially significant occasion in September 2012, I deliberately pursued a deeper walk with God, and He responded with another tangible encounter. The first major encounters had surprised and humbled me; this later one confirmed that hunger, pursuit, and fresh surrender still mattered. The manifestations are never the goal. Jesus is the goal, and the fruit—salvation, restoration, holiness, love, courage, and mission—is what matters.
Making Room for What We Do Not Understand
We need discernment, and Scripture must remain our foundation. I cannot produce a chapter and verse prescribing every manifestation people have experienced in revival. Yet Scripture repeatedly shows people undone by God’s presence and records events far outside our ordinary categories. In Acts 8:39-40, for example, the Spirit suddenly carried Philip away after he baptized the Ethiopian official, and Philip was found at Azotus.
Church history also contains accounts of remarkable awakenings and healings. During the Azusa Street Revival, people of different races worshiped together at a time of deep segregation, and many testimonies of dramatic healing circulated—including blind eyes opening and, in some reports, missing or damaged limbs being restored. Skeptics dispute such accounts, but the larger point remains: Christians in many generations have testified that God still saves, heals, reconciles, and transforms.
We often oppose what we do not understand. I watched a close friend reject the renewal in Melbourne with anger. He became bitter, withdrew, and his life later unraveled, including the loss of his marriage. His story is not a reason to suspend discernment; it is a warning against allowing offense and certainty to harden our hearts.
God’s activity will not always be dramatic. Some of the deepest moments I have witnessed were quiet: a person simply weeping while God healed something hidden in the heart. We should not chase manifestations, but neither should we be alarmed merely because God’s work exceeds our preferences.
The image of fire helps us understand both the attraction and the discomfort. We know how quickly wildfire can spread when timber is dry and wind begins to blow. In the natural world, uncontrolled fire is dangerous. But what if the timber in the Church is ready? What if prayer, hunger, repentance, and the Word have prepared hearts for the wind of the Spirit?
God is not finished lighting holy fires.
An elder told me during worship last Sunday that he saw a picture of artesian wells breaking open in revival. The image stayed with me: pressure from beneath pushes through hard ground until water begins to rise. God’s presence does not only fall from above; it also bubbles up from within. Jesus said that rivers of living water would flow from the innermost being of the one who believes, speaking of the Holy Spirit (John 7:38-39).
We cannot dictate how or when God will come, but we can hoist the sail and ask Him to fill it. We can make our hearts available to the wind of the Spirit.
Hungry for God in Our Generation
Modern life makes spiritual hunger difficult to sustain. We are inundated by information, pressure, work, family needs, and constant communication. Some days we want to throw the cell phone away and escape the noise. Yet the principles that ignited the early Church still matter in the twenty-first century: the Word, prayer, community, faith, surrender, and the power of the Holy Spirit.
Young believers should not wait until some imagined future season to obey God. I am grateful I did not postpone every mission trip, revival meeting, and evangelistic endeavor until retirement. Age brings wisdom, but it also brings fatigue and aches. We should not irresponsibly quit our jobs or run overseas without God’s direction. We should ask what faithfulness looks like now.
This call is not limited to the young. Caleb was eighty-five when he said, “Give me this mountain” (Joshua 14:10-12). Every generation is needed. Young and old must labor together, carrying both fresh strength and seasoned faith.
When the Lord called me to plant this church, I argued that the city already had plenty of churches. His answer has stayed with me for twenty-five years: “There are not enough churches in this city for what I want to do.” I sensed Him saying that as we set out chairs, there would come a day when they would not be enough. I am still holding that word. If its fullness does not come in my lifetime, I believe another generation will see it.
This hunger is not about filling auditoriums for the sake of numbers. I long to see gangs disappear, addiction loosen its grip, violence subside, families restored, and young people rescued rather than lost to drugs and despair. I long for churches across the city and nation to be full because people are hungry for what is real—for Jesus, for His truth, and for the presence of the Holy Spirit.
Before God raised Moses as a deliverer, Israel groaned under oppression. Exodus 2:23-25 says their cry came up to God, and He heard, remembered His covenant, looked upon them, and acknowledged them. The groaning of a people reached heaven, and God answered. When the Church finally says, “Enough is enough; we must have You,” God raises up servants, voices, intercessors, and deliverers who are full of faith and the Holy Spirit.
Prayer meetings may be empty, and hearts may feel dry, but that does not have to remain the status quo. We can become hungry again. We can pray night and day, asking God to breathe on our families, churches, cities, and generation.
Transformed for Purpose
Peter’s story gathers the entire message into one life. Jesus restored a broken man. He gave him a new identity. He joined him to a praying community. He gave him favor for an assignment. Then the Holy Spirit filled him with power to carry out that assignment.
The result was transformation:
• failure became restoration;
• shame gave way to identity;
• fear yielded to boldness;
• weakness was met by power;
• isolation became community;
• prayerlessness became prevailing faith;
• the ordinary became extraordinary; and
• a man who once denied Jesus became a witness who carried Jesus into the world.
This is not a call to become impressive. It is a call to surrender. Be open. Be hungry. Be available. Let the Word of Christ dwell richly in you. Sit at His feet. Walk with His people. Receive the Holy Spirit’s power, and let Him keep forming your character.
If you have never given your life to Jesus, you can begin now: “Jesus, I believe You died for me and rose again. Forgive my sin. I give my life to You. I want to follow You. Fill me with Your Spirit.”
If you have grown weary or dry, ask for a fresh touch. The Spirit who empowered Peter and Stephen has not changed. Ask Him for fresh hope, fresh vision, holy love, courage, and power for your assignment. We do not need another generation’s testimony alone; we need God’s work in our time.
You were not merely saved from something. In Christ, you have been transformed for something. Grace is rewriting your future. The Word has given you a foundation. The Spirit has come to give you life and power. Now say yes to Jesus, and carry His presence into the world.
