Chapter 3. Peter the Missionary

The apostle Peter decided to live dangerously. He could have had a safe, secure and comfortable existence on the gentle shores of the Sea of Galilee. There was plenty of fishing for him there and opportunity for him to minister to needy people in Galilee where Jesus had been so popular and where they had wanted to make him their king.

But Jesus had called him to do more than just live comfortably. ‘Come, follow me,’ Jesus had said. Peter had followed as a disciple for three years. At the end of that time Jesus came back with a new challenge. ‘Feed my sheep,’ he said. ‘Do you love me? Well feed my lambs.’ 1 The acceptance of this challenge meant a tremendous turnaround in his life.

His first visit to Antioch

Peter visited Antioch, where the early believers and followers of ‘the Way’ were first called ‘Christians’. It was probably earlier than the famous Council of Jerusalem because, while Peter was at Antioch, he needed to argue over the very issues that had already been decided at the Council. 2

Peter had met with Paul when Paul had visited him for a two-week stay, three years after Paul’s conversion. 3 Some fourteen years later, Paul again visited Jerusalem, meeting with Peter and the other leaders of the church. 4

At this time Paul’s particular mission was recognized as being to the Gentiles, and Peter’s as being to the Jews scattered across the Mediterranean world. As Paul commented: ‘They saw that God had given me the task of preaching the gospel to the Gentiles, just as he had given Peter the task of preaching the gospel to the Jews. For by God’s grace I was made an apostle to the Gentiles, just as Peter was made an apostle to the Jews.’ 5

Paul returned to Antioch after his first missionary journey. He had been greatly troubled by the Judaisers in Galatia who insisted on believers observing Jewish customs before they could be accepted as Christian. Paul argued that faith in Christ was enough. Back at Antioch, Peter had learnt from his experiences at the homes of Simon, the tanner at Joppa, and Cornelius, the centurion at Caesarea, of how the Holy Spirit could dwell in Gentiles as well as Jews. He was now quite willing to eat with Gentiles despite all his traditional upbringing.

But while they both were in Antioch, a message came from James and other leaders in Jerusalem that they should withdraw from table fellowship with the Gentiles. The Jewish Christians in Jerusalem found such new practices hard to understand and a threat to their task of evangelising the Jews who might listen to a message about a Messiah fulfilling the Law, but who certainly would not listen to talk of people breaking down the old traditions and customs that had made them a unique people.

Paul attacked this attitude. He believed Jewish cultural practices were not necessary for salvation. But the Jewish leaders believed that while this was true, the practices were necessary for Christians to have a good standing among the Jewish community and be able to evangelise them.

Peter was torn between his new-found freedom of mixing with the Gentiles and the force of the argument from the leaders in Jerusalem. Peter was bluntly told to break table fellowship with the Gentiles and his old prejudices certainly found this more comfortable. He had an education that fitted a fisherman working in Galilee. We cannot blame him for not using his intellectual capacity to argue through the issue like Paul who had the advantages of extensive graduate training.

It was after this clash with the edict from Jerusalem the Paul wrote his strong letter to the Galatians over the same issue. But the growing controversy had to be ended by confronting its proponents in Jerusalem.

The archaeologist G.A. Eisen discovered in 1916 an important link with the early church. Which excavating a sixth century church he came upon the ruins of an earlier church and, within it, a chalice. It is a plain silver cup surrounded by an outer silver shell beautifully decorated with vines and featuring the figure of Christ with the apostles, including Peter.

This was claimed to be the Holy Grail, the actual cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper. The book and film The Silver Chalice was based on this legend. More recent research resulted in the silver cup being dated from the fourth century. The nineteen centimetre high silver cup is obviously an outer holder to surround an important inner cup, which may have been the original. But this cannot be proved.

The Council of Jerusalem

Although the chapter on James will discuss this first great meeting of the leaders of the first century church in more detail, it is important to note here Peter’s part.

He was central to the whole debate on the relationship of the Gentiles to the Jews in the church, which argument came to be focused in the debate on the teaching: ‘You cannot be saved unless you are circumcised as the Law of Moses required.’ 6 Peter spoke first when the time came to resolve the dispute as was fitting for the one acknowledged as the leading apostle. He said:

My brothers, you know that a long time ago God chose me from among you to preach the good news to the Gentiles, so that they could hear and believe. And God, who knows the thoughts of everyone, showed his approval of the Gentiles by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he had to us. He made no difference between us and them; he forgave their sins because they believed. So then, why do you now want to put God to the test by laying a load on the backs of the believers which neither our ancestors nor we ourselves were able to carry? No! We believe and are saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they are. 7

Then Paul and Barnabas reported all the miracles and wonders that God had performed through them among the Gentiles. The effect was powerful. James could see the force of Peter’s argument, for every meticulous Jew, like Paul and himself who had tried to fulfil all the requirements of the written and oral Law, had groaned under the yoke. But added to the argument was the testimony of these three great men of God who had been blessed in their witness in the areas beyond Jerusalem.

So James summed up the decision: salvation was equal for all, fellowship between Jews and Gentiles was to continue and, provided there was no excessive disregard for moral laws, then they were welcomed into the Christian fellowship on the basis of their faith in Jesus. 8

Peter’s strong argument and personal testimony was instrumental in turning the direction of the early church away from being a mere sect of Judaism and thrusting it into the mainstream of the Western world. Peter now disappears from view in The Acts of the Apostles. But that does not mean he was not involved in widespread missionary service.

Missionary journeys

Jesus had commissioned the disciples to take the gospel into all the world. The Acts of the Apostles outlines the spread of the faith along the lines of the regions mentioned by Jesus. He had told them to begin in Jerusalem, then to Judea, Samaria and the uttermost parts of the world.

Peter was to follow this outline of ministry faithfully. The Acts of the Apostles outlines the stages of the early church’s growth: in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, to Antioch, to Turkey, to Europe, and to Rome. 9 Peter’s ministry, though not fully recorded, ventured into every one of these centres. The first twelve chapters of Acts concentrates on Peter, the rest on Paul.

The missionary journeys of Peter can only be surmised from conjecture, minor references in other passages, from his epistles and Mark’s Gospel, and from tradition.

We should first briefly recap Peter’s missionary journeys. He visited Jewish communities in all the areas where the young church developed, with the exception of Egypt and North Africa. Judea witnessed the bold proclamation of Peter and John, and of Peter’s journeys among groups of believers. Samaritan believers, during a time of peace from persecution, were strengthened by Peter. Joppa, the home of Simon the Tanner, was visited by Peter during a time when Peter travelled everywhere…Lydda…Joppa…Caesarea. 10 Antioch had been the coastal centre where the issue of Jews and Gentiles eating together has arisen. From there Peter returned to Jerusalem.

Asia Minor was to be the scene of Peter’s next missionary journey, and he visited the centres of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. These were all provinces in what is now modern Turkey. This was to limit Paul’s visits in the same area, because Paul had made a commitment not to work over the same area another had visited. 11 This was possibly in AD 51.

Corinth was another centre of Peter’s ministry and a ‘Peter Party’ had grown up in this city following a visit by Peter, after the church had been founded by Paul, and before Paul wrote his first letter to them. This would have been some time after the expulsion of Jews from Rome by Claudius in AD 49, but before Paul’s first letter in about AD 54. 12

Rome had Jewish Christians in her midst from the time some returned from a visit to Jerusalem at the time of the first Christian Pentecost. Paul’s letter indicated a large cosmopolitan community with names that indicate Roman, Greek and Hellenic-Jewish background. 13 After the death of Claudius, his expulsion order lapsed and the new Emperor Nero showed much promise. Peter visited the Jews in Rome in fulfilling his role as apostle to the Jews.

While Peter undoubtedly preached to Gentiles as well as Jews on these journeys, the Jews in Palestine and beyond were his main interest. Most of the early converts were Jews and this undoubtedly is due in part to the ministry of Peter.

The writings of Peter

Unlike Paul, Peter was not an educated man. Yet what he said, when written, had a powerful effect upon the history of the church.

(a) The Gospel of Mark

It has been the unanimous opinion of the church over the ages that Peter told everything that he could remember about the life and teaching of Jesus to a young man, John Mark. His names were both Hebrew and Greek, so it is possible he was educated and bilingual.

One of the early church fathers, Papias, who was a disciple of John, wrote from Hierapolis in Asia Minor in AD 130: ‘Mark, having been the interpreter of Peter, wrote all that he recalled of what was either said or done by the Lord. For he neither heard the Lord nor was he a follower of his, but at a later date of Peter.’ Twenty years later, Justin, writing from Rome, also made the same point, as did Irenaeus writing from Gaul in AD 170, and Clement from North Africa in AD 180. To their knowledge, ‘Mark handed down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter.’

John Mark was a cousin of Barnabas and with Barnabas and Paul went on a missionary journey through Cyprus and southern Asia Minor. Later with his cousin he went on another missionary journey to Cyprus. Paul had not wanted Mark to travel with him again, but later we read that Mark was a ’fellow-worker’ with Paul. 14

It was in young Mark’s mother’s house that Jesus broke bread during his last meal. Her name was Mary and, as a husband is never mentioned, it can be assumed that she was a widow. As she owned the house, kept a maid and it had an outer gate and a large upper room, it was obviously a house of some size and worth. It became the meeting place for the young church. Mark was probably the young man who followed Jesus into the Garden of Gethsemane, witnessed his arrest and ran naked from the guards, leaving his night clothes in the grasp of the soldier – an interesting and vivid detail likely to be remembered only by the person concerned. Like the famous film producer Alfred Hitchcock who always included himself in his films as an obscure bystander, Mark leaves us with a glimpse of himself innocently in the middle of the mighty deeds leading to Calvary. 15

Dr Paul Barnett, lecturer in New Testament History at Macquarie University, Sydney, discusses the contribution of Peter in Mark’s Gospel in his helpful book, Is the New Testament History? He concludes after carefully assembling the evidence: ‘John Mark, then, was from a financially strong background, therefore educated and bilingual. He had been the close colleague of Barnabas, Paul and Peter and, by the time he was fifty years of age, had worked as a missionary with one or both of them for a decade and a half.’ 16

It is helpful to read The Gospel according to Mark underlining every passage where it says something about Peter. This gives a very interesting portrait of Peter in his own words. Mark tells us more of the failures of Peter than any of the other Gospels.

Peter openly told of his own weakness. Mark mentions Peter by name as being present on occasions when Matthew does not mention Peter’s name. Mark includes Peter’s weaknesses, but not praise for him, as though the old fisherman had added humility to his qualities. Mark’s Semitic terms are explained and Greek words are given a Romanised form, as they would if written for a Roman audience.

When Peter proclaimed the gospel to Cornelius and his family in Caesarea, he outlined five points which are repeated as five sections in Mark’s Gospel, as if the Gospel is an expanded version of that sermon Peter would have given on many occasions. The breathtaking movement, the suddenness of the action, the evidence that only an eyewitness could have included as detail and the vividness of the emotions all support the possibility of Mark writing Peter’s account.

The Gospel was written possibly in the late 50s or just after Peter’s death. Probably Mark was with Peter up to the time of his death in Rome. In the persecutions that followed the Roman fire of AD 64, Mark’s Gospel was surely an invaluable aid in helping the early Christians maintain their faith.

(b) The Epistles of Peter

The background of growing persecution is the scene against which The First Epistle of Peter was written close to the end of his life. Both epistles were written form Rome, called ’Babylon’ in Revelation, where Rome is portrayed as the harlot Babylon dripping with the blood of the saints.

In some parts the persecution had already begun. In Pergamum, at the site of the great altar of Zeus, faithful Antipas was roasted to death for his witness to Jesus. Even accepted of the name of Jesus was sufficient to warrant persecution. 17 These words of Peter on how Christians should react to persecution were to be their guiding lights until the peace, which came in the East under the Toleration Edicts of Galerius in 311, and in the West in 313 under Constantine.

In the first epistle, Peter said the trials the Christians in Asia Minor would undergo would last only a limited time and that God would use them as a refiner’s fire. Like Jesus, they would have to suffer for doing good. Such sufferings were part of Jesus’ sufferings. In spite of the persecution, Christians must be obedient to the civil authorities even though greater suffering may come upon them. 18

In the early church, persecution was at first localized. There is no evidence – Hollywood films notwithstanding – of widespread persecution under Nero outside of Rome. But after the murder of James in Jerusalem in AD 62, Christianity ceased to be regarded as a protected sect of Judaism. Subsequently, Christians were open to slander, defamation, mob violence and death. 19

The Second Epistle of Peter was written to help Christians facing false teachers and so speaks of their destruction on the coming ‘Day of the Lord’. The early believers were facing a world of immorality, insubordination, skepticism, the twisting of God’s word and greed. 20

A number of apocryphal works have also been attributed to Peter, but are most unlikely to be authentic. They were attributed to him by enthusiastic writers, although the early church was quick to deny them. The Gospel of Peter was clearly not authentic and, in AD 190, the church at Rhossus in Syria banned the writing because it had inaccuracies and a tendency to heresy. The Apocalypse of Peter, which relies on the schema of The Revelation of John, contains very colourful imaginings of the nature of hell. The Acts of Peter was likewise rejected as apocryphal for its fanciful filling-in of the details of the unknown journeys of Peter, complete with a description of his own martyrdom. However, these second century writings are important for the insights they give us into how Peter was regarded by the early church.

The persecuted pastor

Somewhere near the end of his life, Peter went to Rome. He was not in Rome at the time Paul wrote Romans, but arrived some thirty years after the resurrection of Jesus, when he was about sixty-five.

In the year 64 Nero, in a fit of madness, tried to burn down the slum area of Rome to build a new city worthy of himself. The fire could not be controlled and many people were burnt to death. In the inquiry that followed, Nero blamed the Christians for starting the fire. As a result, many were brought to trial and put to death for their faith.

Some Christians rescued Peter and his wife so that he might continue his ministry of caring for the remainder. Tradition states that, as he turned his back upon the burning city of Rome, where his brothers and sisters were suffering to take the message to another place, he had a vision of Jesus. Jesus looked at Peter and Peter said: ‘Quo Vadis Dominie?’ — ‘Where are you going Lord?’ And Jesus said, ‘I am going to my people, Peter.’ Peter suddenly realized he should not be turning his back on the people and, turning again, he went into the city of Rome.

Peter was taken prisoner and crucified. As they were about to nail him down, he protested that he was not worthy to die as Jesus had. With a mark of grim humour, his executioners nailed him on the cross upside down. So Peter died. This tradition is unanimous and strong in the early writers. Tacitus quotes it, Clement adds that it was at the same time as Paul was executed, Gaius dates it to Nero’s persecution, Dionysius refers to his death as a martyrdom at the same time as Paul’s, Sulpicius Servus speaks of the manner of the crucifixion, and Tertullian reports it.

He was buried, it is said, along the Via Appia where he had been walking, alongside the body of the apostle Paul. The two great preachers of the early church were buried side by side. Eusebius refers to the monuments built to mark the place as ‘trophies of the apostles’, a traditional way of referring to the martyrs.

Christian leaders in Rome, in the year AD 258, are said to have removed the bones of Paul and Peter, Paul’s bones being laid at the church known as ’St Paul’s Outside the Walls’ on the Ostian Way, and Peter’s eventually being laid at the site of a new church which the Emperor Constantine built, the basilica of St Peter.

This site, Vatican Hill, was originally Nero’s gardens where, according to Tacitus, Christians were martyred. In AD 95 Clement, who was Bishop in Rome, wrote to the Corinthian Christians urging them to follow the brave faithfulness of Peter and Paul whom he knew personally, and whom he said were martyred in Rome. This is the first reference to them outside the New Testament. We do not know the exact site of the interred bones. Tradition said it was under the high altar of St Peter’s, but in that greatest and largest of all churches, where several additions have been made, who could excavate underneath the high altar to make sure?

But in 1939, builders had to do some work on the foundations of the high altar in St Peter’s at Rome. Archaeologists found, in the debris underneath, two rows of mausoleums in which wealthy Romans had buried their families. Most of these are from the fourth century. One small mausoleum dating from the third century contains some Christian mosaics. On one wall is a Galilean fisherman, on another is Jonah being swallowed by a whale and on another a damaged mosaic perhaps representing the Good Shepherd. Nearby in similar Christian tomb is a picture of an old man, carefully drawn in red lead and coloured in, featuring a bald head, furrowed brow and pointed beard. The name is Petrus – Peter. Beneath it is a prayer to the apostle requesting his intercession for all the Christians buried nearby.

Nearby is a memorial erected about AD 160 to Peter. Beneath that are the remains of earlier burials, perhaps as early as AD 70 burials and, in a cavity, the bones of a strong, tall, elderly man. As much as the church wanted to, Pope Pius XII stated it was impossible to identify these bones as those of Peter the Big Fisherman. Perhaps in the persecution, the body of Peter was not identified or preserved, but the place where he was martyred would have been identified. The site of St Peter’s is probably the site of his death and maybe the memorial over his remains. One architectural piece of evidence is interesting: the original basilica built by Constantine was orientated around this early mausoleum.

Peter’s influence through the church of Rome

Peter had not founded the church in Rome, but his martyrdom there gave the church great prestige. As the chief city of the empire, the church there assumed a position of importance. The deaths of Peter and Paul gave strength to this assumption. Their deaths gave the church at Rome apostolic roots.

From AD 200, a devout cult grew up around both Peter and Paul. Constantine reinforced this by building over the site of Peter’s martyrdom. By the time of Pope Leo the Great, who died in 461, Peter was claimed as the first bishop of Rome, and the direct antecedent of all subsequent popes, who could now trace their descent to Peter, the leader of the twelve disciples.

There is no New Testament evidence to link Peter with a chain of successive bishops of Rome or that Peter was bishop of Rome during the period AD 41 to 66. If Paul’s sixteenth chapter of Romans was actually written to the Christians in Rome, 21 then it would be incredible that among all the people in the Roman church mentioned, Paul would omit to mention Peter, especially if Peter had been bishop.

According to tradition Paul wrote the Pastoral Epistles to Timothy and Titus, yet he says that during his imprisonment in Rome ’only Luke is with me’. 22 Peter claimed that his mission was to be to the Jews and to the members of the lost ten tribes of Israel. 23 While these verses can be explained in various ways, the collective evidence seems to point to Peter being active among the Jews in Asia Minor rather than being bishop in Rome. However, this does not preclude Peter visiting Rome and dying there, concluding his last journey.

Having said this, we should be careful not to overlook the real significance of Peter in Rome and in the early church. It lies in his original confession of faith that Jesus was the Christ, in his leadership of the Twelve, in his witness to the resurrection, in his message of the gospel on the Day of Pentecost, in his missionary journeys, in The Gospel of Mark and his own epistles, and in the example of his faithfulness unto death. While Peter was neither the theologian nor the missionary strategist that Paul was, he was instrumental in the establishment of the church and its growth since.

Endnotes:

1. John 21:15-19
2. Acts 15:7-11; Galatians 2:11-14
3. Galatians 1:18
4. See Galatians 2:1. It is not clear whether this was fourteen years after Paul’s conversion or fourteen years after Paul’s earlier visit.
5. Galatians2:7, 8
6. Acts 15:1
7. Acts 15:7-11
8. Acts 15:19-29
9. Acts 1:1-6:7 concentrates on Jerusalem; Acts 6:8-9:31 on Judea and Samaria; Acts 9:32-12:24 on Antioch; Acts 12:25-16:5 on Turkey; Acts16:6-19:20 on Europe; and Acts 19:21-28:31 on Rome.
10. Acts 2:42; 6:7; 8:1; 9:31; 8:14,25; 9:32-42
11. 1 Peter 5:13-14; Acts 16:6-7
12. 1 Corinthians 1:12; Acts 18:2,12
13. Acts 2:10; Romans 16:3-16
14. Colossians 4:10; Acts 15:37-39; Philemon 24; 2 Timothy 4:11
15. Acts 12:12; Mark 14:51,52
16. Paul Barnett, Is the New Testament History? Hodder and Stoughton,, p.84
17. Revelation 2:13; 1 Peter 4:12-5:1
18. 1 Peter 1:6-7; 1:11; 2:21-23; 3:18, 4:12-15; 2:13-17; 4:15-17
19. 1 Peter 2:20-23; 3:16; 4:3-4
20. 2 Peter 2:10-12; 3:3-10
21. This is disputed by some scholars who argue that it was the ending of another Pauline letter to Ephesus where he knew so many people after his three year ministry, rather than in Rome which he had not visited.
22. 2 Timothy 4:11
23. Galatians 2:7-9; 1 Peter 1:1

For personal reading

Theme: Effective leader

Monday : Prison (Acts 12:1-19)
Tuesday : Opposition and defence (Acts 11:1-18)
Wednesday : Solution (Acts 15:1-21)
Thursday : Cornerstone (1 Peter 2:4-10)
Friday : Duties (1 Peter 2:11-4:11)
Saturday : Faithfulness (1 Peter 5:1-11)
Sunday : Readiness (1 Peter 4:12-19; 3:15b-19)

For group reading

Topic: Faith and culture

1. Why was it necessary in the first century to resolve the problem of prospective believers becoming Jews before they could join the Christians?

2. What relevance does the issue of circumcision as it affected the young church have today?

3. Are there any rules and regulations that Christians should follow today?

4. How important is it that we know where Peter and Paul were buried?

5. What have you learned from the life of Peter?

Tuesday, 7th July, 2009, 5:10 pm | Bible Studies