Sinclair B. Ferguson

He crumbled before a servant girl.

The stakes were high.

He must have been afraid that if he confessed he was a disciple of Jesus, he might suffer the same fate that Jesus was suffering.

He didn't have deep-seated, complex motivation to deny he knew Jesus.

He was simply afraid.

But Scripture doesn't tell us Peter was saved because his failure was more straightforward, more normal than Judas's, more like our kind of sin.

Nor does Scripture say that Peter was saved because he was regenerate, although Jesus made it clear in the upper room that he was, whereas Judas apparently was not.

Peter's regeneration didn't preserve him from falling and failing.

No, Jesus explained to Peter why and how he would be saved, an explanation that must have been an anchor to his soul that dark Jerusalem night.

Peter was saved because Jesus prayed for him.

Put another way, Peter's salvation wasn't guaranteed by what was done in him, but by what Jesus did for him.

There's a message there for all of us.

Our security doesn't lie in ourselves.

It doesn't even lie in what God has done within us, wonderful although that is.

It lies in Jesus and His intercession for us.

Remember what Hebrews says?

He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.

Peter was learning a great lesson we need to learn too.

It's not by our regeneration that we are preserved.

It's not even by our faith that we are preserved, although the power of God that keeps us does work through faith.