Simon Peter

Assessing the apostle

SIMON PETER
Encountering the Preacher at Pentecost
By Roger Ellsworth
DayOne. 124 pages. £5.00
ISBN 978-1-84625-092-7

This easy-to-read study book of 22 short chapters started off as talks. It can be used privately or in groups.

We can identify with Peter, making lots of mistakes just as we do. I was jumping with pleasure: here would be a very useful book. There are many helpful, encouraging sections. We are taken along at a gallop. Great.

The last chapter speaks of Peter as a good teacher; in between there are things I don't like. Thoughts and words are ascribed to our Lord and to Peter beyond what seems warranted. We should not turn the Bible into a docudrama. Also judgments are made about Peter that seem unfair, keeping in mind Philippians 2.3.

For instance, Peter asks, ‘Should I then forgive seven times?’ He had been taught one way and now he asks, as the Lord's teaching is different. The comment on this (quoted from elsewhere) is:

‘It sounded as if the forgiving spirit were a commodity that could be weighed, measured, and counted; as if it could be parcelled out little by little up to a certain well defined limit, when further distribution would have to stop.’

Another quote describes Peter as ‘probably the most obtuse and spiritually insensitive of them all … the very man among the Twelve who appeared to be least capable of seeing the true significance of anything’.

I like much of the book, but this stops me recommending it for group use. It would be a useful resource for someone doing a study on Peter.

Marjolein M. Reynolds,
Borough Green Baptist Church

© Evangelicals Now - August 2008
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