A young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus. When they seized him, he fled naked, leaving his garment behind. They took Jesus to the high priest, and all the chief priests, the elders and the teachers of the law came together. Peter followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest. There he sat with the guards and warmed himself at the fire.

I can only imagine what Peter and this young man (could it be John Mark?) were going through at this moment. Their whole world — their passion, ambitions, confidence, leader (and, as a result, purpose) — had been completely turned on its head and disrupted.

I have had my whole life seemingly turned upside down a few times. The biggest one was when my mom died of cancer at 48 when I was 13 years old. I was in a relative state of shock for a couple of months. I remember those first few weeks after her death in August back at school. Sometimes I would just run outside of the classroom as I broke into tears. Other times I would respond in incredible anger to those pestering me. Later in life, I learned to handle these situations with more tact, but still struggle to this day with the best response to traumatic events. And most people, if they are truly honest and let themselves feel, do too.

So I can relate to these two men following at a distance. They were trying to see what would happen. Jesus made it very clear in the garden at Gethsemane, he did not want them to fight. So they followed and observed. But when challenged, the young man fled.

Sometimes we are willing to serve Jesus how we want to, just not in the way he wants us to. Peter was willing to die fighting for Jesus (an honorable way to die), but he was not willing to be arrested as his friend (we shall see this later). This young man was willing to observe, but not to stay when confronted.

I am not judging here or even saying the young man should have done something differently. I don’t know because I wasn’t there and don’t know God’s full plan for this moment. But it is interesting to see the panic or shock-like behavior of the disciples when Jesus was arrested.

I think the lesson here for me is: Jesus wants us to grow in our faith, and the only way for this to happen is to trust him in tough circumstances or to trust him after we failed to trust him in tough circumstances. If we play it safe, we will not grow in our faith.

The disciples put everything they had in life on the line for Jesus (with the exception of the thief and betrayer, Judas). And they fell repeatedly as they followed him. But his love is bigger than all of our failures. And he welcomes us, he holds out his hand to help us up, so we can continue to follow him again.

What a great Savior and Lord we serve. He knew the disciples would run away. He knew there would be denial and betrayal. And he loved them all in the midst of their worst sins, restoring them later.

Lord, I am in awe of your great heart of love and forgiveness for me. Expand my heart of love and forgiveness for my fellow man, I pray!